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A   FEW   REMARKS 


SIMEON    FORD 


A  FEW  REMARKS 


BY 


SIMEON    FORD 


Fourth  and  Revised  Edition 


NEW  YORK 

DOUBLEDAY,  PAGE  &  COMPANY 

I909 


Copyright,  loo?,  by 
P.  F.  Collier  &  Son 
Copyright,  iooj,  by 

John  Wanamaker 

Copyright,  1905,  by 

The  Ridgeway-Thayer  Compiny 

Copyright,  1903,  by 

Doubleday,  Page  &  Company 

Published,  June,  190} 


AN  EXPLANATION 

My  best  speeches  never  have  been  reported, 
and  so  have  been  lost  to  posterity. 

A  glance  through  this  volume  will  convince 
any  one  of  the  truth  of  this  statement. 

A  man  can  achieve  notoriety  by  after-dinner 
speaking   more   easily  and   with  less  expen- 
diture of  gray  matter  than  in  any  other  way. 
£  "Among  the  blind    the  one-eyed  man  is 

w     king,"  and  the  run  of  postprandial  offenders 
§     is  so  erudite  and  dreary  that  the  rare   one 
who  illumines  his  remarks  with  even  a  hint  of 
O     humour  is  hailed  as  a  genius. 

And  yet  I  would  not  advise  the  young  man 

. j      seeking  glory  to  tackle  after-dinner  speaking. 

Hardening  of  the  liver  and  softening  of  the 

-»      brain  are  pretty  sure  to  ensue,   and  he  will 

find  that  the  plaudits  of  the  multitude  will 

not  go  very  far  toward  paying  his  board-bill. 

Simeon  Ford. 
v 


A  TALK  TO  THE  BOOK-SELLERS 


A  TALK  TO  THE  BOOK-SELLERS 

PREFATORY  REMARKS   TO  THE  FOURTH   EDITION  * 

r  WAS  brought  here,  not  for  the  purpose 

of    entertaining   or   instructing    you, 

but  to  be  exhibited  as  a  horrible  example 

of  the  debilitating  and  blighting  effect  of 

indulging  in  a  literary  jag. 

Perhaps  you  are  not  aware  of  the  fact 
that  I  am  an  author? 

I  realise  that  I  do  not  look  the  part,  but, 
nevertheless,  I  am;  although  it's  no  fault  of 
mine.  Some  men  are  born  great,  some 
achieve  greatness,  and  some  have  great- 
ness shoved  right  at  'em.  I  trot  in  the 
latter  class. 

*  This  address,  made  before  the  New  York  Book  -  sellers' 
League,  is  reprinted  here  to  explain  matters:  no  attempt  has 
been  made  in  the  following  pages  to  tell  by  notes  or  otherwise 
how  and  upon  what  occasions  the  speeches  were  made;  the 
dinners  have  gone  by,  but  the  character  of  the  trade,  the  hero 
whose  fame  is  celebrated,  and  the  occasion,  remain  as  they  were 
before  and  give  an  excuse  for  printing  new  editions  of  this  book. 

ix 


A  Few  Remarks 

Naturally  I  am  a  shy,  retiring,  and  illit- 
erate cuss,  and  pursue  the  nefarious 
though  necessary  avocation  of  "keeping 
tavern."  But,  in  an  evil  hour,  a  mis- 
guided publishing  house  discovered  that  I 
had  a  genius  for  letters  which  I  had  art- 
fully concealed  for  years,  and  now  I  am 
doomed  to  go  thundering  down  the  ages, 
linked  with  Charley  Dickens,  Willie  Shake- 
speare, George  Ade,  and  other  literary 
fellers.  That  is  to  say,  I  will,  providing 
you  gentlemen  take  hold  and  push  me 
along.  As  a  budding  author  I  am 
looking  for  aid  and  succour,  and  if 
you  will  supply  the  aid  I  will  supply 
the    sucker. 

It  isn't  going  to  be  an  easy  job  selling 
my  book,  you  can  bet  on  that.  Nobody 
is  going  to  buy  it  unless  Force  on  them  is 
brought  to  bear.  In  the  first  place,  my 
portrait  will  appear  in  the  front  of  the 
x 


A   Talk  to  the  Book-sellers 

book.     That  will  have  a  tendency  to  kill 
the  sale  right  at  the  go  in. 

Still,  look  at  Dante  and  George  Eliot 
and  Bill  Nye !  None  of  them  would  have 
been  eligible  for  a  place  in  the  Florodora 
Sextette,  and  yet  their  books  sell  all  right. 
When  us  authors  get  all  "sicklied  o'er 
with  the  pale  cast  of  thought,"  it  has  a 
tendency  to  dim  the  lustre  of  the  eye,  get 
on  to  the  curves,  and  remove  the  dimples. 
I  wish  you  could  have  seen  me  when  I  just 
ran  a  hotel  and  didn't  have  to  use  my 
brain.  I  was  a  dream,  previous  to  be- 
coming a  nightmare. 

I  don't  want  you  to  get  the  idea  that  I 
am  here  to  further  my  own  interests,  or 
to  throw  bouquets  at  myself,  or  to  execute 
a  sonata  upon  my  own  horn.  It  really 
makes  very  little  difference  to  me  whether 
this  book  of  mine  sells  or  not,  because  I 
can  make  an  honest  living,  as  a  hotel- 
xi 


A  Few  Remarks 

keeper,  by  robbing  the  public.  The  fewer 
sold  the  better  for  my  self-respect  and  the 
public  weal.  But  I  feel  sorry  for  my 
publishers.  Of  course,  they  are  not  really 
entitled  to  any  sympathy,  because  they 
brought  this  thing  on  themselves,  but  now 
they  are  in  it  I  can't  help  feeling  that  we 
ought  to  see  them  through.  They  need 
thee,  oh,  they  need  thee  I  every  hour  they 
knead  thee. 

My  publishers  are  the  instigators  and 
perpetrators  of  this  outrage  upon  the 
reading  public.  They  are  a  young  and 
rising  firm,  and  if  you  don't  believe  it  just 
try  to  get  a  rise  out  of  them.  They  cer- 
tainly know  how  to  worry  an  author  into 
undue  prominence.  Before  I  fell  into  their 
clutches  I  was  an  obscure  and  self-respect- 
ing man,  peacefully  pursuing  the  even 
tenor  of  my  way,  unwept,  unnumbered, 
and  unsung,  with  no  reputation  outside 
xii 


A  Talk  to  the  Book-sellers 

of  my  immediate  family,  and  not  much  of 
a  one  there.  Now,  thanks  to  them  and  to 
their  anxiety  to  get  rid  of  my  book,  my 
life  has  become  one  long  nightmare.  My 
bilious  and  dejected  countenance  stares 
reproachfully  at  me  from  every  Sunday 
newspaper  and  patent  insider.  My  hith- 
erto untarnished  name  flames  on  every 
fence,  bill-board,  and  ash-barrel.  I  am 
in  receipt  of  letters  from  widows  in  reduced 
circumstances,  asking  me  to  contribute 
toward  the  expenses  of  their  daughters' 
musical  education.  I  am  invited  to  lay 
corner-stones,  sign  autographs,  buy  tickets 
to  church  sociables  and  coloured  orphans, 
clam-bakes,  and  receive  offers  of  marriage 
from  women  who  are  willing  to  take  long 
chances. 

Before   I  became  an  author  I  looked 
upon  Seymour  Eaton,  Andrew  Carnegie, 
and  R.   H.   Macy  as  our  three  greatest 
xiii 


A  Few  Remarks 

philanthropists.  It  was  this  great  trinity 
which  was  furthering,  ably  and  cheaply, 
the  love  of  letters  and  the  pursuit  of  knowl- 
edge. But  I  have  changed  my  tune.  I 
now  look  upon  them  as  a  combination  in 
restraint  of  trade,  the  discouragers  of 
intellect,  and  the  disseminators  of  bacilli. 

I  read  that  a  man  has  just  got  $1,000,- 
ooo  for  a  patent  bottle  which  cannot 
be  refilled  and  used  a  second  time.  We 
must  get  hold  of  that  man  and  offer  him 
his  own  price  to  invent  a  book  which  can- 
not be  read  by  more  than  one  person.  I 
think  my  book  will  pretty  nearly  fill  the 
bill.  I  think  any  one  who  reads  it  will 
use  his  utmost  endeavours  to  prevent  any 
one  else  from  falling  into  the  same  error. 

This  book  of  mine  is  my  first  offense, 

committed     without     premeditation     or 

malice  aforethought,  and  you  can  gamble 

that  it  will  be  my  last.     I  can  only  plead 

xiv 


A  Talk  to  the  Book-sellers 

my  youth,  my  previous  good  character,  and 
the  fact  that  the  publishers  tempted  me, 
and  I  fell. 

With  each  and  every  volume  the  pub- 
lishers will  furnish  you  a  box  of  dope  pills,  to 
be  administered  to  prospective  purchasers, 
and  the  cover  will  be  of  a  desgin  so  bizarre 
and  startling  as  to  induce  hypnotic  trance, 
weaken  the  reasoning  faculties,  produce 
hysteria  and  morbid  cravings,  and  act  as 
a  mild  laxative  on  the  pocketbook. 

The  book  will  be  so  arranged  that  it  may 
be  used  as  a  paper-weight,  stove-lifter, 
waffle-iron,  egg-beater,  sleep-inducer,  and 
cat-destroyer.  In  addition  to  all  this,  it 
will  contain  the  cream  of  my  after-dinner 
speeches — slightly  curdled  and  cheesy,  but 
warranted  to  cure  the  blues,  remove  warts 
and  bunions,  brighten  the  intellect,  and 
touch  up  the  liver.  Every  customer  who 
makes  affidavit  that  he  has  read  the  book 
xv 


A  Few  Remarks 

will  receive  an  endurance  medal  and  a 
coupon,  which,  when  presented  at  my 
hotel,  accompanied  by  five  cents,  will  en- 
title him  to  a  glass  of  beer. 


XVI 


CONTENTS 

An  Explanation 
A  Talk  to  the  Book-sellers 
Boyhood  in  a  New  England  Hotel 
At  a  Turkish  Bath 
The  Discomforts  of  Travel 
Experiences  in  the  National  Guard 
The  Landlords  in  Cuba 
George  Washington     . 
New  York  as  a  Summer  Resort 
Patriotism 
California 
Joseph    Jefferson 
Bank-Notes 
My  First  Case     . 
On  Woman  and  Bloomers    . 
A  Eulogy  of  Sir  Henry  Irving 
Crockery    .... 
On  the  Automobile     . 
Rules  for  Success  in  the  Hotel  Business 
xvii 


PAGE 

V 

vii 

i 

ii 

19 

29 

41 
51 
65 
7i 
81 

89 

99 
109 
119 
129 

135 
143 
i5S 


xviii        CONTENTS— Continued 


PAGB 

On  Policemen     .... 

I65 

After-Dinner  Speakers 

171 

On  the  Game  of  Golf 

l8l 

Hotel  Suicides     .... 

.       191 

New  Hotels        . 

20I 

Some  More  About  Automobiles     . 

211 

New  York  for  Conventions    . 

221 

Impressions  of  Boston        .          .          , 

23I 

Hotels  in  New  England       .          .          , 

239 

Lord  Beresford  and  the  Pilgrims   . 

247 

In  the  South     .... 

•     25* 

On  Clothes  and  Clothiers     . 

267 

The  Raines  Law 

277 

The  Troubles  of  a  Hotel  Man      . 

285 

The  Hotel  Guest         . 

297 

Amenities  of  Street-car  Traveling 

3°5 

BOYHOOD 
IN   A   NEW  ENGLAND   HOTEL 


BOYHOOD 
IN   A   NEW   ENGLAND   HOTEL 

I  WAS  raised  in  the  State  of  Connecticut, 
but  it  was  no  fault  of  mine.  My 
parents,  before  I  reached  the  age  of 
consent,  experienced  one  of  those  sudden 
reverses  of  fortune  which  have  always 
been  so  popular  in  my  family,  and 
we  left  our  beautiful  New  York  home, 
replete  as  it  was  with  every  luxury, 
including  a  large  and  variegated  assort- 
ment of  chattel  mortgages,  and  moved 
up  into  Windham  County,  right  in  the 
centre  of  the  pie  belt  and  quite  near 
the  jumping-off  place.  It  was  a  lovely, 
beautiful,  quiet,  peaceful,  restful,  health- 
ful, desirable,  bucolic  hamlet,  three  miles 
from  the  cars,  and  far,  far  from  the 
3 


4  A    Few  Remarks 

madding  throng,  and  where  a  man  could 
use  his  knife  for  the  purpose  of  trans- 
ferring nourishment  to  his  mouth 
without  attracting  undue  attention. 
When  I  say  it  was  quiet  I  but  feebly 
describe  it,  but  when  I  say  it  was 
healthful  I  am  well  within  the  mark.  If 
a  man  died  in  that  village  under  eighty 
years  of  age  they  hung  white  crape  on  the 
doorbell  and  carved  a  little  lamb  on  his 
tombstone.  I  left  there  twenty-five  years 
ago  to  seek  my  fortune — which  I'm  still 
seeking — but  the  old  people  who  were  old 
then  don't  seem  any  older  now.  Last 
summer,  when  I  went  up  with  my  children, 
I  noticed  that  the  same  old  people  were 
about,  as  lively  as  ever,  and  the  same  old 
pink  pop-corn  balls  and  jackknives  were 
still  in  the  show-case  of  the  store,  which  I 
used  to  think  I'd  buy  when  I  got  rich,  but 
no  longer  seem  to  crave. 


Boyhood  in  a  New  England  Hotel     5 

We  boarded  at  the  village  hotel,  and 
the  experience  I  gained  there  has  been 
of  incalculable  advantage  to  me  in  later 
years.  Whenever  a  knotty  question  of 
hotel  ethics  presents  itself  to  me, 
I  try  and  decide  what  my  old  landlord 
would  have  done,  and  then  I  do  just  the 
opposite. 

And  yet  he  had  some  good  practical 
ideas  which  I  should  like  to  adopt  in  my 
hotel.  For  instance,  he  expected  his 
guests  to  saw  and  split  their  own 
fire-wood  in  winter,  generously  supplying 
the  cord-wood,  however,  and  the  ax 
as  well,  and  also  the  saw.  If  I 
remember  aright,  we  were  expected  to 
supply  the  pork  wherewith  to  grease 
the  saw,  but  he  furnished  the  saw.  My 
room  was  in  the  third  story,  and  its  ceiling 
slanted  down  rapidly,  so  that  sometimes 
in    the    night,    when    aroused    by   a  rat 


6  A   Few  Remarks 

bounding  joyously  around  on  the  quilt, 
I  would  sit  up  suddenly  and  imbed  portions 
of  my  intellect  in  the  rafters.  In  the  midst 
of  the  room  was  a  sheet-iron  stove,  of 
forbidding  aspect,  which  stood  like  a  light- 
house sequestered  in  the  midst  of  a  great 
Arctic  sea  of  zinc.  It  had  great  powers  as 
a  fuel  consumer,  and  also  the  peculiar 
quality,  so  characteristic  of  country  stoves, 
to  wit,  the  more  fire  you  had  in  the  stove 
the  colder  the  room  seemed  to  become. 
I  made  a  scientific  examination  of  that 
stove,  and  conclusively  demonstrated  that 
of  the  heat  generated  thereby,  125  per 
cent,  went  up  the  flue  and  the  balance  went 
into  the  formation  of  rheumatism,  goose- 
flesh  and  chilblains. 

Being,  naturally,  of  a  somewhat  shiftless 
nature,  I  very  rarely  laid  in  a  stock  of 
wood  at  night,  and  in  consequence  I 
frequently   had   to   go   down   early   of   a 


Boyhood  in  a  New  England  Hotel     7 

winter  morning  and  dally  with  that  wood- 
pile. There  are  a  good  many  cold  things 
in  this  world — cold  hands,  cold  feet,  cold 
bottles,  marble  hearts  and  frozen  faces — 
but  of  all  cold  things  in  this  world,  the 
coldest  is  an  ax-helve  which  has  reposed 
all  of  a  winter's  night  on  a  Connecticut 
wood-pile. 

There  was  another  feature  of  this  little 
hotel  which  commended  itself  to  me.  The 
food  was  good,  plentiful  and  nutritious, 
and  it  was  all  put  on  the  table  at  once. 
The  boarders  were  privileged  to  reach 
out  and  spear  such  viands  as  attracted 
their  fancy,  and  transfer  the  same  to  their 
plates  without  loss  of  time.  Compared 
with  this  JefTersonian  simplicity  of  service, 
the  average  banquet  seems  cumbrous  and 
ornate.  Yet  one  thing  is  certain:  things 
seemed  to  taste  better  in  those  days. 
Why,   I  can  still  remember   the  thrill  of 


8  A    Few   Remarks 

ecstasy  which  vibrated  through  my 
Gothic  system  when  the  sound  of 
the  dinner-bell  fell  upon  my  strained 
and  listening  ear.  With  what  mad 
haste  I  dashed  up  to  the  good  old 
Colonial  wash-stand  that  stood  near 
the  door,  dipped  out  a  tin  basinful 
of  water,  scooped  up  a  handful  of  soft- 
soap  out  of  the  half-cocoanut,  and  pro- 
ceeded to  remove  my  disguise.  And  then 
the  towel !  Ah,  me,  the  towel !  It  was  a 
red-letter  day  in  the  history  of  that  hotel 
when  we  got  a  clean  towel.  And  the 
comb  and  brush !  Perhaps  I  ought  to 
draw  the  veil  of  charity  over  the  comb  and 
brush  ;  and  yet  I  used  them  just  as 
generations  had  done  before  me  and 
generations  then  unborn  are  doing  yet. 
And  when  at  last,  the  mysteries  of 
the  toilet  complete,  with  shining  face 
and  slicked    hair  I  would  descend  upon 


Boyhood  in  a  New  England  Hotel     9 

the  dining-room  and  proceed  to  devastate 
the  eatables — shades  of  Lucullus,  Harvey 
Parker  and  Delmonico,  how  I  did  relish 
my  victuals  in  those  days. 


AT  A  TURKISH   BATH 


AT  A  TURKISH  BATH 

GENTLE  reader,  have  you  ever 
bathed?  Turkish  bathed?  I  wot 
not.  I  have,  woe  is  me,  and  I  am 
now  a  sadder  and  a  cleaner  man.  If 
these  remarks,  which  are  meant  to  be 
deliriously  light  and  playful,  appear 
to  you  to  be  fraught  with  an  underlying 
varicose  vein  of  gloom,  do  not  hastily 
pass  them  by,  but  remember  that  they  are 
in  the  interest  of  science.  I  have  dallied 
with  this  luxury  of  the  Orient  (so-called). 
Also  remember  that  I  have  contracted 
a  deep  sonorous  cold,  which  will,  in  all 
probability,  fondly  nestle  in  my  bosom 
till  my  ulster  blooms  again. 

The  preliminaries  of  the  Turkish  bath 
are  simple.     You  pay  one  dollar  at  the 
13 


14  A    Few  Remarks 

door  and  pass  into  the  cooling-room, 
where  the  mercury  registers  ninety-eight 
degrees.  The  appropriateness  of  this  title 
does  not  burst  upon  you  until  you 
have  visited  the  inner  shrine,  where  the 
temperature  is  up  near  the  boiling  point. 
In  the  "cooling-room"  you  are  privileged 
to  deposit  your  valuables  in  a  safe.  I  did 
not  avail  myself  of  this  boon,  however, 
for  reasons  of  a  purely  private  nature, 
but  passed  at  once  into  the  "disrobing 
room."  This  room  was  not  so  large  as 
to  appear  dreary,  nor  yet  so  small  as 
some  I  have  lodged  in  on  the  Bowery, 
but  was  about  seven  by  four.  The  fur- 
niture was  simple  yet  chaste,  consisting 
of  a  chair  and  a  brush  and  comb  long  past 
their  prime.  The  comb  was  chained  to 
the  wall,  but  the  brush  was  permitted  to 
roam  at  will.  Hastily  divesting  myself 
of  sealskins,  Jaegers  and  other  panoplies 


At  a  Turkish  Bath  15 

of  rank,  I  arranged  them  in  a  neat  pile  in 
the  centre  of  the  room  and  placed  the 
chair  upon  them.  This  simple  precaution 
I  had  learned  while  occupying  a  room 
separated  from  its  fellows  by  low  parti- 
tions. Your  neighbour  may  be  a  disciple 
of  Izaak  Walton,  and  during  your  sleep 
or  absence  may  take  a  cast  over  the 
partition  with  hook  and  line.  What 
could  be  more  embarrassing  than  to 
have  one's  trousers  thus  surreptitiously 
removed.  I  am  a  lover  of  the  "gentle 
art"  myself,  but  I  am  ever  loath  to 
be  played  for  a  sucker. 

I  was  next  ushered  into  the  "  hot  room, " 
where  a  number  of  gentlemen  were  lolling 
about  and  perspiring  affably  and  fluently. 
Being  of  a  timid,  shrinking  nature,  I 
was  somewhat  embarrassed  on  entering 
a  room  thus  filled  with  strangers,  and 
the  more  so  as  I  realized  that  my  costume 


1 6  A    Few  Remarks 

was  too  bizarre  and  striking  for  one  of 
my  willowy  proportions.  So  I  flung 
myself  with  an  affectation  of  easy  grace 
upon  a  marble  divan,  but  immediately 
arose  therefrom  with  a  vivid  blush  and  a 
large  blister.  I  then  sat  upon  a  seething 
chair  until  I  came  to  a  boil,  when  I  rose 
up  and  endeavoured  to  alleviate  my 
sufferings  by  restlessly  pacing  the  room. 
A  few  towels  were  scattered  about,  and 
as  the  nimble  chamois  leaps  from  crag  to 
crag,  so  leaped  I  from  towel  to  towel  in 
my  efforts  to  keep  my  feet  off  the  red- 
hot  floor. 

Having  basked  in  this  room  until  I  was 
quite  aglow,  I  summoned  the  attendant 
and  told  him  he  could  take  me  out  at  once 
or  wait  yet  a  little  longer  and  remove  me 
through  a  hose.  I  then  passed  into  the 
"manipulating  room,"  where  I  was  laid 
out  on   an  unelastic  marble  slab  like  a 


At  a  Turkish  Bath  17 

"found  drowned"  at  the  Morgue,  and 
was  taken  in  hand  by  a  muscular  attendant 
who  proceeded  to  manipulate  me  with 
great  violence.  He  began  upon  my  chest, 
upon  which  he  pressed  until  he  lifted  his 
feet  off  the  floor  and  my  shoulder-blades 
made  dents  in  the  marble.  I  mildly  asked 
if  it  was  absolutely  necessary  that  my 
respiratory  organs  should  thus  be  flattened, 
to  which  he  replied  with  a  rich  Turkish 
accent:  "Come  off,  young  feller;  I  know 
my  biz, "  and  swooped  down  upon  my 
digestive  organs.  Manipulation  consists 
of  disjointing,  dismembering,  bruising  and 
rending  limb  from  limb,  and  may  be 
healthful,  but  it  is  not  popular  with  me. 
This  man  said  he  was  a  pianist  also,  and 
that  he  could  manipulate  and  at  the  same 
time  strengthen  his  fingers  and  improve 
his  technique,  and  to  illustrate  he  struck 
a  few  resounding  chords  in  the  small  of 


1 8  A    Few   Remarks 

my  back  and  then  proceeded  to  interpret 
Wagner  up  and  down  my  vertebrae, 
running  scales,  twiddling  up  in  the  treble 
and  thundering  down  in  the  bass,  just 
as  if  I  were  the  keyboard  of  a  Steinway 
grand,  an  illusion  doubtless  heightened 
by  the  ivory  whiteness  of  my  skin.  He 
wound  up  by  playing  that  grand  show-off 
piece,  the  "Battle  of  Prague,"  while  I 
joined  in  with  the  "  Cries  of  the  Wounded. " 
It  was  a  fine  rendering,  no  doubt,  but 
next  time  I  am  to  be  played  upon  I  shall 
ask  for  a  soft  andante  movement — a 
Chopin  nocturne,  say. 


THE   DISCOMFORTS   OF  TRAVEL 


THE   DISCOMFORTS   OF  TRAVEL 

IT  is  conceded  that  there  is  nothing 
more  educating  and  refining  than 
travel.  It  is  also  conceded  that  nothing  is 
more  conducive  to  travel  than  free  passes. 
You  can  now  understand  why  I  am  so 
highly  educated  and  so  refined. 

I  know  of  nothing  which  so  enhances 
the  pleasure  of  a  railroad  trip  as  a  pass. 
It  smooths  out  all  the  asperities  and 
fatigues  of  the  journey.  "It  maketh 
glad  the  wilderness  and  the  solitary 
places,  and  maketh  the  desert  to  rejoice 
and  blossom  as  the  rose. "  I  have  often 
risen  up  and  left  a  comfortable  fireside, 
kind  friends  and  solicitous  creditors, 
and  journeyed  to  remote  and  cheer- 
21 


22  A    Few  Remarks 

less  localities  in  which  I  was  quite  uninter- 
ested, lured  thereto  by  the  magic  influence 
of  a  pass.  You  all  know  how  Svengali 
hypnotized  poor  Trilby,  simply  by  a  few 
passes. 

The    immortal    poet,    Longfellow,    was 
'way  off  when  he  wrote: 


"Try  not  to  pass,"  the  old  man  said: 
"Dark  lowers  the  tempest  overhead; 
The  roaring  torrent  is  deep  and  wide." 
And  loud  that  clarion  voice  replied — 
"Excelsior." 


Now  the  old  man  probably  advised 
the  youth  not  to  try  the  pass,  because  he 
knew  if  he  did  and  got  one  he  would  never 
be  asked  to  pay  fare  again  without  feeling 
that  an  outrage  was  being  perpetrated  on 
him.  The  opium  habit  is  a  positive 
virtue  compared  with  the  pass  habit. 
The  fact  that  one  is  in  no  way  entitled  to 
free   transportation    only    stimulates   one 


The  Discomforts  of  Travel  23 

in  the  desire  to  ride  at  some  other  fellow's 
expense. 

One  of  the  most  dangerous  laws  we 
have  is  the  one  forbidding  office-holders 
to  accept  passes.  It  keeps  our  leading 
citizens  out  of  politics.  Some  one  said 
(in  a  moment  of  temporary  aberration  of 
mind)  that  he'd  "rather  be  right  than 
President"  ;  but  I'd  rather  have  an  annual 
on  the  New  York  Central  than  be  an 
Assemblyman  in  the  tents  of  wickedness. 
(That's  another  Biblical  quotation.) 

The  only  drawback  about  using  a  pass 
(in  addition  to  the  loss  of  your  self- 
respect)  is  the  harrowing  thought,  which 
constantly  hovers  over  you,  that  in  case  of 
accident  your  mangled  remains  will  be 
of  no  cash  value  to  your  afflicted  family. 
It  is  a  safe  plan  when  traveling  on  a  pass 
to  spend  a  portion  of  your  ill-gotten  gajns 
on  an  insurance  policy.     Then  in  case  of 


24  A    Few  Remarks 

accident  your  last  moments  will  be 
soothed  by  the  thought  that  you  have 
beaten  the  game  both  ways. 

But  inasmuch  as  I  have  never  succeeded 
in  worming  a  pass  out  of  the  sleeping-car 
people,  I  feel  at  liberty  to  make  a  few 
remarks  on  that  branch  of  the  railroad 
service,  not  in  a  carping  spirit,  but  more 
in  sorrow  than  in  anger. 

It  is  frequently  remarked  (especially 
in  advertisements)  that  travel  in  our 
palace  cars  is  the  acme  of  comfort  and 
luxury,  and  I  guess  they  are  about  as 
perfect  as  they  can  be  made  and  still  pay 
dividends  on  diluted  stock;  and  yet, 
after  a  night  in  one,  I  always  feel  as  if  I 
had  been  through  a  severe  attack  of 
cholera   infantum. 

In  winter,  especially,  the  question  of 
temperature  is  trying.  The  mercury,  soon 
after     you     start,     bounds     up    to     one 


The  Discomforts  of  Travel  25 

hundred  and  ten  degrees  in  the  shade. 
You  endure  this  until  you  melt  off  several 
pounds  of  hard-earned  flesh  and  then  you 
muster  up  courage  to  press  the  button. 
You  "keep  a-pushin'  and  a-shovin'"  until 
you  lay  the  foundation  of  a  felon  on  the 
end  of  your  finger,  and  finally  the  dusky 
Ethiopian  reluctantly  emerges  from  his 
place  of  concealment  and  gazes  at  you 
scornfully.  You  suggest  that  the  tempera- 
ture is  all  right  for  "  India's  Coral  Strand, " 
but  is  too  ardent  to  be  compatible  with 
Jaeger  hygienic  underwear.  Whereupon 
he  removes  the  roof,  sides  and  bottom 
of  the  car  and  the  mercury  falls  to  three 
below  zero,  while  you  sit  there  and  freeze 
to  death,  not  daring  to  again  disturb  him 
lest  you  sink  still  further  in  his  estimation. 
That  night  he  gets  square  with  you  for 
your  temerity  by  making  up  your  berth 
last;  and  when,   at   3    a.   m.,  you   finally 


26  A    Few  Remarks 

retire,  you  wonder  why  you  didn't  sit  up 
and  doze  instead  of  going  to  bed  to  lie 
wide  awake. 

Some  folks  sleep  in  sleeping-cars — any 
one  who  has  ears  can  swear  to  that — but 
I  am  not  so  gifted.  I  attribute  this  mainly 
to  the  blankets  (so-called!).  Bret  Harte 
says  a  sleeping-car  blanket  is  of  the  size  and 
consistency  of  a  cold  buckwheat  cake  and 
sets  equally  as  well  upon  the  stomach. 
Certainly  they  are  composed  of  some 
weird,  uncanny  substance,  hot  in  summer, 
cold  in  winter,  and  maddening  in  spring 
and  fall.  For  a  man  of  three  foot  six  they 
are  of  ample  proportions;  for  a  man  six 
foot  three  they  leave  much  to  be  desired, 
and  the  tall  man  is  kept  all  night  in  sus- 
pense as  to  whether  he  had  best  pull  up 
the  blanket  and  freeze  his  feet  or  pull  it 
down  and  die  of  pneumonia. 

And  then  the  joy  of  getting  your  clothes 


The  Discomforts  of  Travel  27 

on  in  the  morning,  especially  in  an  upper 
berth !  To  balance  yourself  on  the  back 
of  your  neck,  and  while  in  this  constrained 
attitude  adjust  your  pants  without  spill- 
ing out  your  change  or  offending  the 
lady  in  the  adjoining  section,  requires 
gymnastic  ability  of  no  mean  order. 
You  are  at  liberty  to  vary  this  exercise, 
however,  by  lying  on  your  stomach  on 
the  bottom  of  the  car  and  groping  under 
the  berth  for  your  shoes  which  the  African 
potentate  has,  in  the  still  watches  of  the 
night,  smeared  with  blacking  and  artfully 
concealed. 

But  what  a  change  comes  o'er  the 
dusky  despot  as  you  approach  your  desti- 
nation. That  frown  before  which  you 
have  learned  to  tremble  is  replaced  by  a 
smile  of  childlike  blandness.  His  solicita- 
tion regarding  your  comfort  during  the 
last  ten  minutes  of   the  journey  is  really 


28  A    Few  Remarks 

touching.  And  when,  at  last,  he  draws 
his  deadly  whiskbroom  upon  you,  all 
your  resentment  disappears  and  you  freely 
bestow  upon  him  the  money  which  you 
ave  been  saving  up  to  give  your  oldest 
daughter  music  lessons. 


EXPERIENCES   IN   THE   NATIONAL 
GUARD 


EXPERIENCES   IN   THE   NATIONAL 
GUARD 

I  TOO,  am  a  battle-scarred  veteran. 
For  seven  long  years  I  fought,  bled 
and  died  in  the  Twenty-third  Regiment 
of  Brooklyn,  thus  relieving  myself  of  the 
possibility  of  serving  a  week  every  year 
on  the  jury.  I  calculate  that  if  I  live 
to  the  ripe  age  of  three  hundred  and 
sixty-four  years  I  will  have  made  by  the 
operation.  When  I  joined,  however,  I 
did  not  look  at  it  in  this  cold,  cynical 
way. 

It  was  in  the  chill  summer  of  1876  that 

I    enlisted.     The   temperature   that  July, 

as  indicated  by  the  mercury,  was  above 

the  normal,  but  nevertheless  it  proved  to 

31 


32  A    Few  Remarks 

be  a  cold  summer  for  me.  I  was  in  the 
first  flush  of  early  youth  then — about  the 
only  flush  I  ever  drew  to  and  caught — 
and  had  not  yet  reached  the  age  of  con- 
sent; so  my  parents  consented  for  me. 
Often  afterward  I  wished  they  had  been 
less  anxious  to  gratify  my  budding  military 
yearnings,  for  my  proud,  haughty,  seven- 
dollar-a-week  spirit  soon  chafed  under 
the  privations  and  hardships  of  a  soldier's 
life. 

I  enlisted  under  a  misconception.  I 
was  given  to  understand  that,  in  the  first 
place,  I  would  acquire  a  military  carriage. 
A  carriage  was  something  I  had  always 
wanted.  When  I  got  into  the  awkward 
squad,  and  was  started  in  on  the  "  setting- 
up"  drill  in  order  to  acquire  my  carriage, 
I  began  to  lose  my  enthusiasm  right  away. 
Touching  my  feet  with  the  tips  of  my 
fingers   without   bending   my   knees   was 


Experiences  in  the  National  Guard  33 

not  only  galling  to  my  pride  and  severe 
on  my  suspenders,  but  proved  to  be 
a  physical  impossibility,  owing  to  my 
peculiarly  lofty  fireproof  construction. 
My  feet  were  too  far  away. 

It  did  not  comport,  either,  with  my  pre- 
viously conceived  notions  of  a  military 
career.  I  had  expected  to  begin  at  once 
prancing  about  behind  a  band  playing 
martial  strains.  I  had  an  idea,  too,  that 
when  arrayed  in  uniform  I  would  be  a 
dream  of  martial  pomp  and  splendour, 
and  that  beautiful  young  ladies  would 
strew  flowers  in  my  pathway.  This  proved 
to  be  erroneous.  When  arrayed  in  uni- 
form I  was  a  sight,  and  beautiful  young 
ladies  fled  swiftly  at  my  approach. 

I  will  not  pain  you  with  a  recital  of  the 
sickening  details  of  my  squad  experience, 
nor  the  barbarities  to  which  I  was  sub- 
jected.    At    last    I    was    graduated    and 


34  A.   Few  Remarks 

with  fear  and  trembling  fell  in  with  the 
company.  I  was  received  with  that  sweet 
courtesy  and  grace  with  which  a  new  squad 
or  detail  is  always  greeted,  and  as  I 
attempted  to  fall  in  among  the  men  of  my 
own  height,  was  shouldered  down  the 
line  until  finally  I  landed  at  the  sawed-orf 
end,  from  whence  I  was  ignominiously 
dragged  by  the  Sergeant  and  placed  behind 
a  tall  Corporal  in  whose  grateful  shade  I 
luxuriated  for  seven  years.  Never  once 
did  I  get  into  the  front  rank  in  all  that 
time.  The  amount  of  profanity  I  extracted 
from  that  Corporal  during  my  career, 
however,  was  a  partial  recompense.  It  was 
a  habit  of  mine  when  marching  or  drilling 
to  fall  into  a  dark-brown  study,  and 
when  my  Corporal,  who  would  be  serenely 
bowling  along,  would  suddenly  discover 
himself  in  advance  of  the  short-legged 
end  of  the  company,  he  would  naturally 


Experiences  in  the  National  Guard  35 

pause,  and  I,  being  immediately  behind, 
would  proceed  to  meander  up  his  person, 
to  his  great  physical  inconvenience.  He 
would  then  make  remarks  of  a  nature 
calculated  to  pain  the  refined. 

It  was  on  rainy  and  muddy  days, 
however,  that  I  made  things  particularly 
interesting  for  him.  By  reason  of  our 
height  we  always  marched  in  the  gutter, 
and  my  Corporal's  white  trousers  when  I 
got  through  with  him  were  a  sight  calcu- 
lated to  wring  tears  from  the  stoutest 
washwoman. 

I  don't  know  how  it  is  now,  but  in  my 
time  it  was  the  favourite  practice  of  the 
commanding  officer  to  bring  us  to  the 
position  of  "carry  arms"  and  then  go  off 
and  quite  forget  us  until  his  attention 
was  brought  back  by  the  thud  of  some 
debilitated  warrior  falling  dead  on  the 
floor.     ' '  Carry  arms ' '  was  never  a  favourite 


36  A  Few  Remarks 

position  of  mine,  owing,  possibly,  to  my 
physique — weighing  less  than  the  gun  and 
being  only  about  half  as  thick.  ' '  Support 
arms"  I  could  not  enjoy,  either,  because 
the  hammer,  resting  on  my  forearm,  used 
to  quickly  bore  its  way  into  my  vitals. 
"Order  arms"  was  my  favourite.  There 
was  something  restful  and  soothing  about 
that  maneuver  which  always  appealed 
to  me. 

I  joined  in  1876  so  I  could  go  to  the 
Centennial  with  the  regiment.  I  went 
down  and  got  so  "het  up"  that  I  haven't 
got  quite  cooled  off  yet.  Perhaps  you 
remember  that  Philadelphia  was  quite 
sultry  that  year.        * 

We  marched  from  the  armory  to  South 
Ferry  in  heavy  marching  order.  Each 
man  carried,  if  I  recollect  aright,  provi- 
sions for  six  months,  a  complete  set  of 
bedroom  furniture,   a  parlour  organ  and 


Experiences  in  the  National  Guard  37 

a  Herring  safe.  At  least,  that's  the  way- 
it  felt.  By  the  time  we  reached  the  ferry 
we  were  in  quite  a  glow.  We  camped  in 
Fairmount  Park,  a  lovely  spot  replete 
with  verdure  and  mosquitoes.  We 
enjoyed  the  former  and  the  latter 
enjoyed  us.  That  experience,  how- 
ever, gave  me  a  realizing  sense  of  the 
horrors  of  war  which  still  lingers  in  my 
memory.  It  also  gave  me  a  touch  of 
malaria  which  still  lingers  in  my  system. 
Quelling  riots  was  my  specialty.  As 
a  riot-queller  my  reputation  was  excellent, 
especially  in  my  immediate  family.  Per- 
haps my  warlike  and  ferocious  appear- 
ance had  something  to  do  with  my 
success.  I  was  not  as  fleshy  then  as  I 
am  now,  and  when  arrayed  in  my  shad- 
bellied  coat  and  my  inverted  flowerpot 
hat  with  a  blue-sausage  pompon  I  was  a 
sight  calculated  to  freeze  the  blood.     My 


45 


38  A  Few  Remarks 

figure  was  such  that  near-sighted  rioters 
had  difficulty  in  telling  which  was  me  and 
which  was  the  gun. 

Once  when  I  was  quelling  a  riot  up  the 
State,  rude,  burly  rioters  came  and  gazed 
at  me  when  I  was  on  guard,  and  as  they 
gazed  they  came  to  realize  that  grim- 
visaged  war  with  all  its  horrors  was  in 
their  midst,  and  that  were  they  to  attempt 
to  monkey  with  me  I  was  liable  at  any 
moment  to  ' '  cry  Havock  !  and  let  slip  the 
dogs  of  war,"  but  I  never  did.  I  was 
always  relieved,  however,  when  they  left 
me  unmolested,  because  I  was  inclined 
to  be  fastidious  about  imbruing  my  hands 
in  gore.  In  fact,  I  always  considered 
imbruing  one's  hands  in  gore  to  be  an 
untidy  habit. 

Still,  I  was  ever  ready  at  my  country's 
call,  unless  I  had  a  few  hours  ^tart,  and 
am  yet;  and  as  I  sat  in  my  richly  mort- 


Experiences  in  the  National  Guard  39 

gaged  home  last  night,  rocking  the  cradle 
with  one  foot  and  writing  this  extempo- 
raneous address  with  the  other,  the  thought 
flashed  through  my  mind  that  perhaps 
soon  again  I  might  prick  up  my  ears  like 
the  old  war  horse  at  the  sound  of  the 
bugle,  and  like  the  old  war  horse  I  might 
be  tempted  to  answer  with  a  nay. 


THE  LANDLORDS  IN  CUBA 


THE   LANDLORDS   IN   CUBA 

YOU  may  have  noticed  in  the  papers 
something  about  the  war  we  have  had. 
It  was  a  brief  and  glorious  war.  Some  folks 
are  talking  so  much  about  the  mistakes 
which  the  Government  made  that  they 
forget  the  glory.  We  hotel  men  meet 
the  same  class  of  people  occasionally. 
As  long  as  everything  is  0.  K.  they 
preserve  a  dignified  silence,  but  let  them 
run  up  against  a  spring  chicken  which  has 
sown  its  wild  oats,  or  an  egg  old  enough 
to  know  better,  and  straightway  then- 
lamentations  fill  the  air. 

I  have  but  one  criticism  to  make.     The 
Government    overlooked    the  hotel  land- 
lords.    It    might    also   be   said   that   the 
43 


44  A  Few  Remarks 

landlords  overlooked  the  Government. 
I  don't  think  any  landlords  went  to  the 
front.  It  isn't  really  necessary  for  a 
landlord  to  go  to  the  front,  because  he 
can  stay  right  behind  his  counter,  touch 
a  button,  and  the  "Front"  will  come  to 
him — and  there's  always  plenty  of  ice- 
water  on  our  front ! 

Suppose,  however,  that  the  Secretary 
of  War  had  appointed  some  of  us  hotel 
men  to  help  out  in  Cuba.  Do  you  suppose 
the  boys  would  have  lacked  for  food? 
Every  private  would  have  been  supplied 
with  lobster  a  la  Newburgh,  and  apple 
dumplings  with  plenty  of  hard  sauce,  and 
similar  delicacies.  And  landlords  would 
make  brave  soldiers  !  Don't  you  suppose 
we  would  stand  up  under  fire?  Look 
how  we  get  "stood  up"  every  day  without 
a  murmur ! 

Suppose  the  landlords  had  been  asked 


The  Landlords  in  Cuba  45 

to  go  up  the  hill  of  San  Juan — such  men 
as  Boldt,  of  the  Waldorf;  and  Baumann, 
of  the  Holland;  and  Charley  Delmonico 
and  Louis  Sherry — and  that  Teddy  Roose- 
velt had  given  the  order  to  charge ! 
Don't  you  suppose  that  these  fellows 
would  have  charged?  Why,  charging  is 
their  specialty !  Charging  up  hill  and 
down  !  If  those  fellows  had  charged,  the 
hearts  of  the  Spaniards  would  have  gone 
clear  down  into  their  boots.  When  those 
landlords  charge  everybody  has  to  go 
down  into  his  socks. 

There  ought  to  have  been  landlords  in 
the  navy,  too.  We'd  make  good  sailors. 
The  Spanish  shot  would  have  had  no 
terrors  for  us.  We  are  all  accustomed  to 
highballs.  We  wouldn't  be  much  good 
at  hand-to-hand  fighting,  however,  for 
if  the  order  came  to  repel  boarders  we'd 
mutiny  on  the  spot.     But  at  long  range 


46  A  Few  Remarks 

we'd  be  irresistible.  We  could  have  blown 
the  Spanish  off  the  seas.  When  it  comes 
to  "blowing  off,"  you  must  admit  we 
have  no  superiors. 

Sometimes  I  feel  sorry  for  those  Spanish 
sailors.  It  certainly  was  a  disagreeable 
experience  for  them.  We  know  that  they 
are  not  good  at  running.  Walking  is 
the  specialty  of  the  Spanish. 

I  met  one  of  the  Spanish  officers  and  he 
told  me  about  the  engagement.  As  he 
didn't  understand  English  and  I  am  quite 
ignorant  of  his  lingo,  our  conversation 
was  necessarily  limited,  but  I  gathered 
from  him  that  the  experience  gave  him  a 
feeling  of  severe  ennui.  To  be  hit  in  the 
back  of  the  neck  by  a  thirteen-inch 
projectile  is  not  only  galling  to  the  haughty 
pride  of  Old  Castile,  but  it  is  also  liable 
to  disarrange  the  collar  button. 

Personally,  I  have  always  found  going 


The  Landlords  in  Cuba  47 

to  sea  trying  enough  at  the  best,  but  to  be 
pursued  by  a  fleet  of  emotional  iron-clads 
belching  and  vomiting  forth  shot  and  shell 
in  the  direction  of  your  southern  exposure 
must  add  new  horrors  to  mal  de  mer.  Fancy 
the  sensation  of  being  on  a  vessel  which 
is  being  perforated  with  monotonous 
regularity  by  cannon-balls  of  about  the  size 
and  consistency  of  Grover  Cleveland, 
until  finally  the  noble  fabric,  already  over- 
burdened by  a  Spanish  name  of  sixteen 
syllables,  sinks  beneath  the  wave,  and  you 
are  constrained  to  plunge  into  the  moist 
and  heaving  billow  and  make  your  way 
to  shore,  where  the  noble  Cuban  army 
is  spitting  on  its  hands  in  anticipation  of 
your  arrival. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  Admirals  Samp- 
son and  Schley  and  their  fellows  done  noble. 
Far  be  it  from  me  to  withhold  from  them 
that  meed  of  praise  which  is  their  due.     I 


48  A  Few  Remarks 

don't  know  what  "a  meed  of  praise"  is, 
but,  whatever  it  is,  I  will  not  withhold  it. 
But  I  dare  say  that  sometimes,  as  they 
hastily  adjust  their  baseball  masks  on 
hearing  the  approaching  footsteps  of 
designing  females,  or  see  their  pictures 
adorning  advertisements  of  porous  plasters 
and  purgative  pellets,  or  see  their  names 
pulsating  from  every  lager-beer  and  oyster 
saloon,  and  listen  night  after  night  to 
words  of  praise  from  us  orators — I  dare 
say  that  at  such  times  they  often  wish  that 
some  other  fellows  had  got  their  job.  I 
have  never  been  a  popular  idol  myself, 
and  see  no  immediate  prospect  of  being 
one,  but,  really,  I  should  think  being  a 
hero  must  have  its  disadvantages. 

Take  the  case  of  poor  Hobson,  for 
instance !  When  I  remember  how  that 
heroic  man  had  to  kiss  his  way  across 
the  continent,  going  up  against  everything 


The  Landlords  in  Cuba  49 

in  the  female  line  without  regard  to 
age,  onions  or  previous  condition  of 
servitude,  with  never  a  murmur,  my 
heart  bleeds  for  him.  Sinking  the 
Merrimac  in  the  face  of  the  Spanish 
batteries  required  nerve,  but  think  of  the 
nerve  of  exchanging  microbes  with  two 
hundred  and  sixty-seven  women  in  one 
afternoon,  with  no  interval  for  antiseptics. 


GEORGE  WASHINGTON 


GEORGE   WASHINGTON 

IF  ever  a  man  lived  who  was  justified 
in  being  stuck  on  himself,  it  was 
G.  Washington,  late  of  Mount  Vernon. 
He  has  since  been  stuck  on  a  good 
many  things — principally  letters — or, 
rather,  his  likeness  has.  You  have 
all  noticed  George's  likeness  as  it 
appears  on  the  two-cent  postage  stamps, 
wearing  a  look  of  entire  self-satisfaction 
and  a  collar  cut  somewhat  lower  in 
the  neck  than  is  now  considered  de 
rigeur  among  the  beau  monde.  It  has 
frequently  and  truly  been  remarked  that 
George  was  never  licked  until  he  got  on 
a  postage  stamp,  and  then  only  when  his 
back  was  turned.  It  may  not  be  consid- 
53 


54  A  Few  Remarks 

ered  amiss  for  me  to  suggest,  in  connection 
with  this  fine  old  Revolutionary  joke, 
that  any  one  who  would  lend  his  counte- 
nance to  some  of  the  recent  issues  of  two- 
cent  stamps  deserves  to  be  licked;  and  I 
firmly  believe  that,  if  the  person  who 
compounds  the  flavouring  extract  used 
on  the  back  thereof  could  be  located,  his 
name  would  go  thundering  down  the  ages 
linked  with  that  of  Benedict  Arnold, 
J.  Iscariot,  and  other  gentlemen  whose 
popularity  is  on  the  wane. 

But  to  revert  to  G.  Washington.  I 
repeat  that  he  had  just  cause  to  throw 
bouquets  at  himself,  for  certainly  he  pos- 
sessed to  a  preeminent  degree  the  gift 
of  getting  his  name  in  the  papers  and 
histories  and  third  readers,  and  having 
streets  and  pies  named  after  him,  without 
its  costing  him  a  cent.  Look  at  that  tale  of 
the  little  hatchet  and  the  cherry  tree,  with 


George  Washington  55 

which  you  are  doubtless  familiar.  Think 
of  the  free  advertising  he  got  out  of  that 
comparatively  trifling  incident !  I  used 
to  have  that  story  rubbed  into  me  when  a 
child  until  it  warped  and  soured  a  naturally 
sunny  and  lovely  nature.  That  George 
was  startled  into  telling  the  truth  upon 
this  occasion  we  are  bound  to  admit ;  but 
note  the  forced  and  ostentatious  way  in 
which  he  did  it,  as  though  saying  to  the 
grandstand,  "Look  at  me  knock  the 
cover  off  it  for  three  bases."  Think,  my 
hearers,  how  often  you  yourselves  have 
inadvertently  been  betrayed  into  telling 
the  truth,  and  yet  you  never  set  up  a 
claim  to  be  "first  in  war,  first  in  peace  and 
first  in  the  hearts  of  your  countrymen. " 

How  a  man's  whole  life  may  be  influ- 
enced by  a  trifling  circumstance.  Suppose 
George's  father,  instead  of  being  a  senti- 
mental old  cuss,  on  hearing  that  his  son 


56  A  Few  Remarks 

had  been  monkeying  with  edged  tools, 
had  hastily  removed  him  to  the  seclusion 
of  the  wood-shed,  and  had  then  and  there, 
with  a  shingle  or  other  convenient  weapon, 
proceeded  to  tan  that  portion  of  George's 
anatomy  which  the  British  were  never 
permitted  to  gaze  upon.  Instead  of  grow- 
ing up  to  be  the  father  of  his  country, 
he  might  have  become  morose  and  sullen, 
and  developed  into  a  life  insurance  solicitor 
or  an  advertising  agent  or  a  map  pedler, 
or  even  fallen  to  still  greater  depths  of 
depravity.  The  moral  of  all  this  is,  that 
one  should  ever  strive  to  tell  the  truth, 
even  at  some  personal  inconvenience, 
especially  when  one  is  likely  to  be  found 
out   anyhow. 

Much  has  been  made  of  the  incident  of 
crossing  the  Delaware.  Every  one  is 
sick  of  the  picture  representing  that 
aquatic    feat.      George     stands,    as     you 


George  Washington  57 

remember,  right  in  the  prow,  in  the  full 
glare  of  the  calcium,  in  such  a  position 
that,  had  the  boat  bumped  into  one  of 
the  numerous  cakes  of  ice  which  were 
floating  about,  he  would  have  taken  a 
tumble  into  the  turgid  tide.  But  George 
never  tumbled  !  George  never  took  water  ! 
His  features  wear  an  expression,  as  Bill 
Nye  says,  as  though  he  had  just  become 
aware  of  the  presence  of  a  glue  factory 
on  the  opposite  shore.  His  massive  brow 
is  crowned  with  a  neat  triangular  hat  of  a 
now,  happily,  obsolete  pattern,  and  his 
cloak  is  carelessly  thrown  back  over  his 
shoulder  so  as  to  best  display  the  cute 
red  lining.  His  whole  demeanour  is  that 
of  innate  majesty,  commingled  with  dolce 
far  niente,  nnx  vomica  and  pro  bono 
publico,  and  the  likeness  is  so  speaking 
that  we  can  almost  hear  G  >ay,  "It 

may  be  a  little  chilly  around  here,  but  it's 


58  A  Few  Remarks 

a  cold  day  when  the  father  of  his  country 
gets  left;  and,  cold  as  it  is,  I'm  not  the 
only  pebble  on  the  beach — there's  other 
coons  as  warm  as  me. " 

I  have  sometimes  fancied  that  the  artist 
did  not  depict  George  as  he  actually 
appeared  on  that  occasion,  for  the  chances 
are  he  wore  ear-muffs  and  chilblains,  had 
a  piece  of  pork  bound  around  his  throat 
with  a  red  flannel  rag,  and  had  his  feet 
tied  up  in  hay ;  because  research  shows  us 
that  it  was  a  cold,  cold  winter  and  George 
got  the  frozen  face  ever  and  anon  or  even 
oftener.  Crossing  the  Delaware  was  all 
well  enough  in  its  way,  but  to  one  accus- 
tomed to  crossing  Amsterdam  Avenue  on 
the  way  home  from  the  Colonial  Club,  in 
all  stages  of  sobriety,  with  the  elevated 
road  thundering  overhead  and  the  cable- 
cars  swooping  up  and  down  with  clanging 
bells   on   the   dead   level,    it   seems   as   if 


George  Washington  59 

crossing  the  Delaware  would  be  a  mere 
frolic. 

But  Valley  Forge  was  tough — I  must 
admit  that.  When  I  think  of  those 
ragged  Continentals  waltzing  up  and 
down,  leaving  bloody  feet-tracks  in  the 
snow,  I  am  greatly  moved.  I've  often 
had  cold  feet  myself,  and  have  even 
dallied  with  cold  hands,  but  I  never  yet 
have  been  called  upon  to  let  my  rich, 
red  heart' s-blood  flow  out  through  my 
feet  at  my  country's  call,  and  I  trust  I 
never  will.  I  never  go  down  into  our 
cafe  and  gaze  upon  the  free  lunch  which 
is  there  displayed  in  all  its  colonial 
simplicity  and  severity,  but  I  am 
forcibly  reminded  of  the  sufferings  of  the 
starving  soldiers  at  Valley  Forge. 

I  hate  to  stand  up  here  and  shatter  a 
public  idol,  and  ruthlessly  yank  George 
off   the   lofty   perch   where   he   has   been 


60  A  Few  Remarks 

enshrined  in  history's  pages,  but  I  can't 
help  thinking  that  in  some  things  he 
showed  a  singular  indifference  to  the 
rights  of  posterity.  Take  a  little  thing, 
now,  like  the  selection  of  the  date  of  his 
birth.  Could  he  possibly  have  hit  upon 
a  more  disagreeable  date?  What  is  the 
use  of  a  holiday  on  the  22nd  of  February? 
It's  too  late  for  sleighing  or  skating  and 
too  early  for  golf  or  bicycling.  The  only 
thing  it  is  good  for  is  to  break  up  the 
business  week  and  give  a  man  an  oppor- 
tunity to  hang  around  the  house  and 
smoke  too  many  cigars  and  aggravate 
his  poor,  patient  wife,  and  exasperate 
his  children,  and  make  himself  generally 
obnoxious  to  all  with  whom  he  comes  in 
contact.  Perhaps  it  will  not  be  considered 
meet  for  me  to  sound  my  own  praises, 
but  when  the  time  comes  that  the  anni- 
versary of  my  natal  day  will  be  made  the 


George  Washington  61 

occasion  of  public  rejoicings,  it  is  a  satis- 
faction for  me  to  know  that  I  picked  out 
a  date  when  a  man  can  go  fishing,  or 
swimming,  or  shooting,  or  sailing,  and 
not  a  bleak,  miserable  day  at  the  fag  end 
of  the  most  cussed  month  of  the  year. 
And  yet,  simple  justice  demands  that  I 
should  say  that  perhaps  George  was  not 
consulted,  and  that  at  that  early  portion 
of  his  career  his  parents  arranged  his 
dates  for  him. 

And  yet  far  be  it  from  me  to  withhold 
from  George  that  meed  of  praise  which  is 
his  due.  George  certainly  had  his  strong 
points,  and  the  manner  in  which  he 
played  tag  with  the  British  army,  always 
managing  to  be  on  the  hunk  when  they 
caught  up  with  him,  and  to  be  "it"  most 
of  the  time,  incontestably  proves  that  he 
was  a  smooth  article.  Take  him  for  all 
all.  he  was  a  great  and  good  man,  and 


62  A  Few  Remarks 

I  trust  that  nothing  which  I  have  said 
about  him  will  detract  from  his  fame. 
"It's  a  wise  child  that  knows  its  own 
father,''  and  if  you  want  to  know  the 
father  of  your  country  you  must  hear 
both  sides.  Faith  will  move  mountains, 
but  it  will  never  lift  a  chattel  mortgage, 
and  you  can't  believe  everything  you 
hear. 

To  look  at  George  as  he  appears  in  that 
beautiful  portrait  in  the  Colonial  Club — 
one  of  the  eight  hundred  and  seventy-five 
genuine  portraits  for  which  he  sat — you 
would  think  he  was  just  waiting  to  feel 
his  wings  sprout,  but  don't  you  believe 
he  was  so  slow.  During  my  brief  yet 
ignominious  career  I  have  already  seen 
some  eight  hundred  and  fifty  different 
houses  in  which  George  temporarily  so- 
journed, and  he  must  have  been  pretty 
quick  in  order  to  have  played  all  these 


George  Washington  63 

one-night  stands  and  still  preserved  his 
reputation  unspotted.  In  order  to  pre- 
serve an  unspotted  reputation  you  have 
got  to  look  out  that  nobody  spots  you. 


NEW  YORK  AS   A   SUMMER 
RESORT 


NEW   YORK   AS   A   SUMMER 
RESORT 

SUMMER  resorts  are  not  a  specialty  of 
mine.  In  fact,  I  don't  go  to  summer 
resorts,  except  near-by  ones,  and  then  only 
for  the  day.  When  night  comes  I  scurry 
back  to  little  old  New  York.  I  never  care 
to  wander  from  my  own  bathtub. 

New  York  is  hot  sometimes— there's 
no  doubt  about  it.  But  a  little  heat 
doesn't  hurt  a  man,  provided  he  dresses, 
eats  and  drinks  rationally.  It  is  also 
prudent  not  to  carry  around  too  much 
flesh  in  summer. 

I  never  do. 

It  is  also  well  when  eating  and  drinking 
to  exercise  care  in  the  selection  of  a  good 
eating  and  drinking  place.  There  are 
67 


68  A  Few  Remarks 

several  such  in  New  York.  I  could 
mention  one  in  particular,  but  I  hate  to 
talk  about  myself.  And,  besides,  I  am 
not  in  the  hotel  business  for  profit,  but 
simply  for  my  health  and  for  the  good 
of  the  public. 

Children  ought  to  get  out  of  the  city  in 
the  summer.  They  need  green  grass  and 
trees,  shady  lanes,  bosky  dells,  sequestered 
nooks,  sylvan  glades,  babbling  brooks 
and  the  whole  business,  and  it  is  perfectly 
proper  that  their  female  relatives  should 
accompany  them.  But  for  an  able-bodied 
male  adult,  between  the  ages  of  eighteen 
and  eighty,  New  York  City  offers  un- 
equaled  attractions  for  the  summer. 

In  the  first  place,  he  has  his  own  bath- 
tub, and  that  means  much  nowadays. 
To  perform  one's  ablutions  with  the  aid  of 
a  cute  little  pitcher  containing  a  pint  of 
lukewarm   water,    and   a    coy,    shrinking 


New    York    As    a   Summer   Resort  69 

towel  about  the  size  and  consistency  of  a 
second-hand  porous  plaster,  is  calculated 
to  make  one  peevish  and  dissatisfied. 
And  then  a  man  has  his  bed  with  real 
hair  in  it,  and  pillows  which  he  can  find 
without  a  search  warrant.  And  he  has 
his  clothes  in  his  closets  and  wardrobes 
in  a  Christian  way.  This  having  to  lift 
seven  trays  out  of  a  Saratoga  trunk  every 
time  you  want  to  get  at  your  lingerie 
soon  palls  upon  the  jaded  senses. 

And  if  one  feels  the  need  of  an  occasional 
outing,  just  think  what  New  York  has  to 
offer,  lying,  as  she  does,  environed  by 
ocean,  rivers,  bay,  and  that  most  glorious 
of  inland  seas,  Long  Island  Sound.  No 
other  place  affords  such  an  endless  variety 
of  water  trips.  Every  day  for  weeks,  if 
need  be,  some  new  excursion  on  the 
water  may  be  taken,  leaving  the  city  in 
the  morning  and  returning  in  the  evening 


jo  A  Few  Remarks 

in  time  for  dinner,  and  after  that  a  season 
of  calm  enjoyment  on  some  aerial  roof- 
garden,  where  cool  drinks  and  invigorating 
soubrettes  are  freely  dispensed. 

New  York  is  good  enough  for  me. 
And,  although  I  am  perfectly  willing  to 
accept  such  sympathy  as  may  be  lavished 
upon  me  by  those  who  spend  the  summer 
away  from  the  city,  I  find  very  little 
difficulty  in  beguiling  the  tedium  of  the 
heated  term  right  here  in  the  metrolopus. 


PATRIOTISM 


PATRIOTISM 

IT  is  every  man's  duty  to  become 
patriotic  at  least  once  a  year,  especially 
when  it  can  be  done  for  ten  dollars  a  plate, 
including  wine.  Certainly  it  is  a  relief, 
after  putting  in  a  hard  day's  work  swear- 
ing off  taxes,  and  evading  jury  duty,  and 
trying  to  bunco  the  commonwealth  in  other 
ways,  to  attend  a  banquet  and  get  filled 
up  with  enthusiasm  and  spiritus  frumentt 
and  love  of  country,  and  shout  oneself 
hoarse  at  the  mention  of  "Old  Glory." 
We  go  home  feeling  that  we  are  better 
men — better  citizens — better  patriots — 
but  awake  the  next  day,  alas !  with  a 
dark-brown  and  entirely  different  feeling, 
and  resume  our  "ways  that  are  dark  and 
our  tricks  that  are  vain." 
73 


74  A  Few  Remarks 

I  know  of  nothing  which  stimulates 
patriotism  like  a  trip  abroad.  People 
who,  when  at  home,  are  inclined  to  be 
lukewarm  and  criticize  our  Government 
severely,  become  violently  and  painfully 
American  across  the  water,  insist  on 
unfurling  the  Starry  Banner  upon  very 
slight  provocation,  and  make  themselves 
generally  obnoxious.  "Oh,  yes,"  they 
say,  "your  pyramids  are  well  enough,  but 
you  ought  to  see  the  glue  factory  down 
our  way  ! "  But  note  how  their  patriotism 
peters  out  as  they  approach  our  shores  and 
prepare  to  give  the  customs  officers  the 
dinkey-dink.  Alas !  how  few  of  us  can 
stand  the  test  of  patriotism  when  we 
desire  to  bring  in  a  sealskin  sack  or  a 
fur-lined  overcoat ! 

An  excellent  stimulus  to  patriotism 
are  the  societies  which  have  been  formed 
for  the  purpose  of  looking  up  progenitors 


Patriotism  7  5 

who  were  not  fortunate  enough  to  avoid 
the  draft  in  1776.  How  eagerly  we  pry 
into  the  past  to  find  some  forefather  who 
acquired  glory,  chilblains  and  undying 
fame  at  Valley  Forge  or  some  other 
Revolutionary  winter  resort.  The  fact 
that  we  have  numerous  poor  relatives 
right  at  hand,  clamouring  for  recognition, 
interests  us  not  at  all.  We  may  have 
fathers  and  grandfathers  who  fought  and 
bled  in  1862,  but  we  take  no  heed  of  them. 
When  they  turn  out  with  their  torn  flags, 
meekly  following  the  smug  militia,  we 
smile  condescendingly  and  turn  away. 
They  are  too  recent.  What  stirs  our 
blood  is  the  thought  that  we  are  eligible 
to  become  Sons  or  Daughters  of  the 
Revolution,  Children  of  the  Revolution, 
and  wear  cute  little  badges,  and  be  Regents 
and  things,  and  have  banquets  once  a 
year,    and     fall    on    each    other's    necks 


76  A  Few  Remarks 

and    tell    each    other    what     hot     stuff 
we  are. 

Personally,  I  never  took  much  stock 
in  this  remote  ancestor  business.  I'd 
rather  have  one  little  innocent  child  to 
warm  my  heart  and  gladden  my  home 
than  a  whole  graveyard  full  of  ancestors, 
and  I  guess  I'm  more  likely  to.  I  know 
people  who  are  so  busy  tracing  their 
pedigrees  back  to  Alfred  the  Great  that 
they  can't  find  time  to  pay  their  wash 
bills.  What's  the  use  of  knowing  that 
diluted  royal  blood  courses  in  your  veins, 
when  the  butcher  with  his  little  bill  is 
roosting  on  your  doorstep  ?  In  my  opinion, 
what  we  need  to  worry  about  is  posterity. 

There  is  no  satisfaction  in  knowing  that 
you  have  come  down  straight  from  a 
royal  line  when  your  oldest  son  is  spending 
all  his  evenings  drawing  to  a  royal  flush. 
What  comfort  can  it  give  you  to  know 


Patriotism  7  7 

that  your  ancestor  smelt  powder  at 
Bunker  Hill,  when  your  second  boy  is  all 
smelt  up  with  cigarettes?  "Let  the  dead 
bury  its  dead. "  We  are  not  liable 
for  our  ancestors — but  for  posterity  we 
are  directly  responsible,  or  think  we  are. 

There  are  times,  of  course,  when  it 
pays  to  be  exclusive.  Noah  was  doubtless 
better  off  in  the  ark,  mingling  with  his 
own  set,  than  he  would  have  been  out  in 
the  swim  with  the  vulgar  herd.  But,  as  a 
rule,  in  this  brand  new  democratic  country, 
it  isn't  safe  to  acquire  blue  blood  too 
rapidly,  for  if  we  pry  into  the  past  too 
closely  we  are  liable  to  come  with  a  dull, 
sickening  thud  up  against  some  ancestor 
calculated  to  bring  the  blush  of  shame  to 
our  patrician  cheek. 

I  did  not  attend  the  crowning  of  Lavinia, 
Queen  of  the  Holland  Dames,  but  I  was  at 
the  French  Bull  Terriers'  Convention  which 


78  A  Few  Remarks 

followed  it  the  next  evening,  and  I  think 
I  witnessed  the  more  dignified  function 
of  the  two.  Certainly  there  was  no  doubt 
about  the  breeding  of  the  bull  terriers, 
and  they  displayed  exquisite  taste,  for 
one  of  them  tried  to  bite  me.  I  don't, 
believe  one  of  them  would  have  been 
guilty  of  the  absurdity  of  wearing  a 
Siegel-Cooper  crown  in  this  land  of  the 
free,  because  a  bulldog  never  bites  off 
more  than  he  can  chew.  Lavinia  must 
have  been  'most  tickled  to  death  when  that 
crown  was  stuck  on  her — and  I  imagine 
that  was  the  only  thing  that  was  stuck  on 
her,  with  the  exception,  perhaps,  of  the 
coronation  expenses. 

When  it  was  suggested  to  Washington, 
at  the  close  of  the  war,  that  he  accept  a 
crown  at  the  hands  of  the  army,  he  replied 
that  he  was  at  a  loss  to  conceive  what  he 
had  ever  done  to  have  it  supposed  that  he 


Patriotism  79 

could  for  a  moment  listen  to  a  suggestion 
so  fraught  with  mischief  to  his  country. 

That  shows  the  difference  between  a 
great  man  with  a  great  mind  and  a  little 
woman  with  a  big  head. 


CALIFORNIA 


CALIFORNIA 

WE  who  come  from  the  cold,  effete  and 
clammy  East,  filled  as  we  are  with 
pride  and  codfish,  pie  and  self-esteem,  have 
been  touched  and  electrified  by  the  kind- 
ness and  courtesy  which  has  been  so 
prodigally  bestowed  upon  us  hotel  men 
from  the  moment  we  entered  the  portals 
of  this  lovely  land.  California  is  well 
named  the  "Golden  State,"  for  though 
the  precious  metal  has  well-nigh  disap- 
peared from  her  streams  and  hills,  there 
is  a  stock  of  pure  gold  in  the  hearts  of  its 
people  which  seems  inexhaustible. 

Now,  that  is  quite  a  burst  of  eloquence 

for  me  !     Some  folks  simply  have  eloquence 

to  burn  and  don't  mind  the  smell  of  smoke ; 

but  with  me  eloquence  is  as  infrequent  as 

83 


84  A  Few  Remarks 

a  porterhouse  steak  in  a  ten-dollar-a-week 
boarding-house.  I  suffer  from  an  ingrowing 
intellect.  I  trust,  therefore,  that  you  will 
fully  appreciate  my  remark  about  the 
gold  in  your  hearts  and  understand  that  I 
don't  mean  to  intimate  that  you  have  a 
streak  of  yellow  in  your  make-up. 

Since  deciding  to  make  a  trip  to  Cali- 
fornia, I  have  been  reading  up  the  history 
of  the  '49-ers  and  what  they  went  through 
to  get  out  here.  Some  of  our  party  went 
through  a  good  deal  to  get  here.  Some 
of  them  went  through  everything  I  had, 
except  my  return  ticket,  and  now  I  find  it 
so  lovely  here  I  almost  wish  they'd  got 
that,  too. 

This  delicious,  languid  climate  just 
suits  my  dolce  far  ntente  style  of  archi- 
tecture. I'd  like  to  get  some  not  too 
ardent  position  out  here,  like  picking 
blossoms  off  a  century  plant. 


California  85 

"  My  willing  soul  would  stay 
In  such  a  frame  as  this; 
And  sit  and  sing  herself  away 
To  everlasting  bliss." 

That  is  from  one  of  Watts' s  hymns, 
and  I  have  always  noticed  that  old  Watts 
knew  what's  Watt.  But,  instead,  I'll  have 
to  hurry  back  to  New  York  and  chase  the 
fitfu  and  elusive  boarder — a  pastime  more 
exciting  than  profitable  in  these  days. 

But  come  what  may,  we  hotel  men  will 
never  forget  the  boundless  hospitality  of 
the  "wild  and  woolly  West,"  and  the 
glories  of  this  land  of  sunshine  and  of 
flowers,  and  the  wonders  of  this  climate. 
We  are  having  some  of  this  climate  canned 
to  take  home  with  us. 

Already  we  have  forgotten  the  fatigues 
and  privations  of  our  trip  across  the 
continent;  of  how,  when  crossing  the 
desert,  no  water  passed  our  parched  lips 
for  many  moons;  of  how  our  eyesight  has 


86  A  Few  Remarks 

been  impaired  looking  for  the  three-of-a- 
kind  that  never  came ;  of  how,  night  after 
night,  our  rest  has  been  broken  and  the 
ambient  air  rudely  shattered  by  the 
stertorous  breathing  of  our  plump  con- 
tingent, and  the  conversational  powers 
of  our  sisters  and  our  cousins  and  our 
aunts;  of  how  we  came  flying  across  the 
continent,  the  Chicago  landlords  in  front 
of  us,  the  Boston  landlords  behind  us — 
there  we  were  like  Mohammed's  coffin, 
suspended  between  heaven  and  earth,  or 
perhaps  it  would  be  better  to  say,  "  'twixt 
the  devil  and  the  deep  sea. "  And  we 
have  almost  forgotten  the  awful  dust — ■ 
for  once  New  York  had  to  take  Chicago's 
dust,  but  we  passed  it  along  to  Boston. 
And  the  changes  of  climate  !  As  soon  as 
we  got  on  our  linen  dusters  and  palm-leaf 
fans  we  ran  into  fourteen  feet  of  snow,  and 
by  the  time  we  had  donned  our  fur  over- 


California  87 

coats  and  red  mittens  the  mercury  went 
up  to  one  hundred  and  twenty  degrees 
in  the  shade.  Really  some  one  ought  to 
invent  a  patent,  automatic,  self -regulating, 
back-action,  ball  bearing,  self-adjusting 
style  of  underwear  for  transcontinental 
travelers. 

All  these  privations  and  hardships  have 
been  forgotten  since  we  entered  California, 
and  could  the  X-rays  be  turned  upon 
us  the  fact  would  be  disclosed  that 
we  are  filled  to  overflowing  with  kindly 
feelings  toward  our  hosts,  as  well  as  with 
prunes  and  fruit,  canned  goods,  native 
wines,  evaporated  peaches,  liver-pills 
and  gratitude. 


JOSEPH  JEFFERSON 


JOSEPH   JEFFERSON 

MR.  JEFFERSON  has  graphically 
described  the  horrors  of  stage- 
fright  and  he  knows  its  symptoms, 
and  if  he  will  diagnose  my  case 
he  won't  need  any  X-rays  to  see  that 
I  have  it  in  its  most  malignant  form. 
It  may  seem  strange  that  a  man  who 
knows  enough  to  keep  a  hotel  open  doesn't 
know  enough  to  keep  his  face  closed;  but 
it  is  no  fault  of  mine.  Why,  Mr.  Toast- 
master,  with  all  these  orators  sitting 
around,  bursting  with  suppressed  speeches, 
have  you  sprung  me  upon  these  innocent 
people  ? 

I  would  like  to  say  some  of  the  graceful 
things  about  Mr.  Jefferson  that  are  boiling 
within  me,   but  I  haven't  the  power.     I 
9i 


92  A  Few  Remarks 

am  not  built  that  way ;  and  besides,  I  am 
afraid  his  hat  will  bind  a  little  to-morrow 
as  it  is,  and  it  would  be  a  pity  to  have  him 
at  this  late  day  get  stuck  on  himself.  It's 
a  dangerous  thing,  Mr.  Jefferson,  to  get 
stuck  on  an  actor. 

I  have  followed  Mr.  Jefferson's  career 
with  interest  from  early  boyhood  (that  is, 
from  my  boyhood).  At  first  I  watched 
him  from  above — from  the  family  circle, 
where  we  had  to  take  off  our  jackets  so 
we  could  sit  closer.  I  watched  him  as 
"Rip  Van  Winkle"  while  my  scalding 
tears  fell  upon  the  heads  of  the  bloated 
aristocrats  beneath  until  they  had  to 
raise  their  umbrellas,  and  my  merry, 
infectious  laugh  echoed  and  reverberated 
from  those  far  heights  until  the  guardian 
of  the  gallery  swooped  down  and  repressed 
my  boyish  enthusiasm  with  a  club. 

As  I  became  more  affluent  I  descended 


Joseph  Jefferson  93 

through  the  various  strata  of  the  theatre 
until  now  I  have  reached  the  $2.50  seats 
purchased  on  the  sidewalks — which  are 
said  to  be  worthless — and  some  day  yet  I 
may  get  into  a  box. 

And  still  my  scalding  tears  fall  over 
Rip's  tribulations,  but,  alas  !  my  merry, 
infectious  laugh  is  not  now  sufficiently 
contagious  to  occasion  alarm. 

I  relate  all  this,  not  that  it  is  of  the 
slightest  interest,  but  I  want  Mr.  Jefferson 
to  know  that  I  have  freely  contributed  to 
his  support  all  these  years,  for  he  must 
realize  that,  although  I  can't  talk,  money 
talks.  I  know  enough  to  put  up,  if  I 
don't  know  enough  to  shut  up. 

But  I  never  thought  to  stretch  my 
legs  under  the  same  mahogany  with  Mr. 
Jefferson  (you  notice  how  I  have  stretched 
'em),  and  as  I  stand  here,  six  feet  in  my 
stocking    feet    (for  I  do    wear    stockings, 


94  '         A  Few  Remarks 

although  my  looks  may  belie  it),  I  can 
feel  myself  swelling  with  pride — it  may 
not  be  visible  to  the  naked  eye,  but  I  am 
swelling — so  that  I  almost  fear  I  shall 
be  laid  up  to-morrow  with  what  Artemus 
Ward  used  to  call  "a  severe  attack  of 
embonpoint." 

And  yet  I  don't  know  why  I 
shouldn't  sit  at  the  table  with  him, 
for  there  are  some  things  in  common 
between  the  actor  and  the  landlord, 
and  yet  more  which  are  not  in  common. 
The  landlord  gives  the  people  bed  and 
board,  while  in  the  theatre  they  get  no 
bed  but  sometimes  get  bored,  though 
never,  of  course,  when  Mr.  Jefferson  is 
on  the  stage.  The  landlord  gives  his 
patrons  the  best  the  market  affords  (in 
his  advertisements),  while  the  actor  has 
a  certain  delicacy  about  receiving  from 
his  audiences  the  products  of  the  market — 


Joseph  Jefferson  95 

especially  the  vegetable  products.  Poor 
Bill  Nye  used  to  have  a  recipe  for  removing 
egg-stains  from  the  garments  of  lecturers 
and  actors — but  that  is  neither  here  nor 
there.  The  pathway  of  our  guest  has 
for  many  years  been  strewn  with  flowers, 
not  fruit — and  certainly  not  hen  fruit. 

And,  finally,  while  it  is  the  actor's 
privilege  to  prance  upon  the  boards,  -it  is 
the  landlord's  privilege  to  prance  upon 
the  boarders. 

You  remember  when  Rip  inquires  of 
the  innkeeper — "Is  this  the  village  of 
Falling  Water?"  and  the  innkeeper  replies, 
or  would  if  he  were  up-to-date:  "Yes; 
since  Tom  Piatt  took  to  regulating  the 
heavens  above  and  the  earth  beneath, 
we  have  had  Water,  water  everywhere, 
but  not  a  drop  to  drink.  And  the  Raines 
bill  descended  and  the  floods  came,  and  the 
wind  blew  and  beat  upon  that  house,  and 


9  6  A  Few   Remarks 

dear  old  Governor  Morgan  hardly  knew 
which  side  of  the  fence  to  drop  on  in  order 
to  keep  out  of  the  wet;  and  now  the 
clubs  have  to  hang  their  liquor  licenses 
on  the  outer  walls  and  the  free  lunch 
has  vanished  like  a  tale  that  is  told,  and 
there  is  weeping  and  wailing  and  gnashing 
of  teeth:  and  the  band  plays  on." 

That  sentence  is  a  little  involved,  but 
it  shows  that  I  am  highly  educated. 

What  a  character  was  that  of  Rip ! 
If  such  a  person  should  appear  in  real  life 
to-day,  with  that  clouded  intellect  and 
those  Pfefferian  whiskers  trimmed  to  every 
favouring  gale,  he'd  be  sent  to  Congress 
as  a  silver  Senator  in  spite  of  everything. 

As  a  landlord  I  have  had  much  to 
do  with  actors  and  they  have  had  much 
to  do  with  me,  and  some  of  them  have 
done  me.  I  am  the  proud  possessor 
of      perhaps      the      largest      and      most 


Joseph  Jefferson  97 

interesting  collection  of  actors'  trunks 
extant.  If  I  were  asked  to  describe  a 
vacuum  I  would  say,  "A  vacuum  is  the 
contents  of  an  actor's  trunk  left  with  a 
landlord  as  collateral  for  unpaid  board." 
If  the  Cathode  rays  were  to  penetrate  one 
of  these  trunks,  when  they  got  inside 
they  would  die  of  homesickness.  I  haven't 
one  of  Mr.  Jefferson's  trunks,  however. 
I  wish  I  had  and  then  I  could  say,  with 
Shakespeare's   Lucius: 

"Draw  you  near, 
To  shed  obsequious  tears  upon  this  trunk." 


BANK-NOTES 


BANK-NOTES 

AS  I  sat  here  this  evening,  listening  to 
the  strains  of  that  fine  old  banker's 
anthem,  entitled,  "When  You  Ain't  Got 
No  Money,  Why  You  Needn't  Come 
Around,"  I  was  thinking  what  a  grand 
idea  it  was  for  you  magnates  to  get 
together  once  a  year  to  exchange  ideas 
and  settle  among  yourselves  what  shall  be 
done,  and  who  shall  be  done,  and  how  you 
will  do  them.  Personally,  I'd  prefer  to 
exchange  checks  rather  than  ideas  with 
many  here  present;  not  but  what  the 
ideas  are  all  right,  but  somehow,  when 
money  talks,  I  am  always  a  fascinated 
listener. 

This  is  the  first  opportunity  I  have  had 
of  meeting  you  bank   presidents  collect- 
ion 


102  A  Few   Remarks 

ively,  and  when  you  were  thawed  out.  I 
have  met  most  of  you  individually,  when 
you  were  frozen  stiff.  I  never  supposed 
you  could  warm  up,  as  you  seem  to  have 
done,  my  previous  impressions  having 
been  of  the  "How'd  You  Like  to  Be 
the  Iceman?"  order.  Sometimes  I  have 
thought  I'd  almost  rather  go  without  the 
money  than  get  a  congestive  chill  in  a 
bank  president's  office,  and  have  him  gaze 
into  my  eyes,  and  read  the  inmost  secrets 
of  my  soul,  and  ask  unfeeling  questions, 
and  pry  rudely  into  my  past,  and  throw 
out  wild  suggestions  about  getting  Mr. 
Astor  to  indorse  for  me,  and  other  similar 
atrocities.  And  even  if  I  succeed  in 
deceiving  him  he  leads  me,  crushed, 
humiliated  and  feeling  like  thirty  cents,  to 
a  fly  cashier,  who,  taking  advantage  of 
my  dazed  condition,  includes  in  my  three- 
months'  note,  not  only  Christmas  and  the 


Bank -Notes  103 

Fourth  of  July,  but  St.  Patrick's  Day, 
Ash  Wednesday,  and  sixteen  Sundays, 
so  that  by  the  time  he  has  deducted  the 
interest,  what's  coming  to  me  looks  like 
a  Jaeger  undershirt  after  its  first  interview 
with  an  African  blanchisseuse.  That's 
the  kind  of  thing  the  poet  had  in  mind 
when  he  wrote : 

"I  know  a  bank  whereon  the  wild  thyme  grows." 

I  have  observed  that  one's  reception  at 
a  bank  varies  somewhat  with  the  condition 
of  the  money  market.  Go  in  when  money 
is  easy  and  the  president  falls  on  your  neck, 
calls  you  by  your  first  name,  and  cheerfully 
loans  you  large  sums  on  your  Balloon 
Common  and  your  Smoke  Preferred,  and 
you  go  on  your  way  rejoicing.  The  next 
day,  news  having  arrived  that  a  Gordon 
Highlander  has  strained  a  tendon  in  his 
leg  while  sprinting  away  from  a  Dutchman 
near  Ladysmith,   money  goes  up  to   180 


104  A  Few  Remarks 

per  cent,  a  minute,  and  you  get  a  note 
requesting  you  to  remove  your  Balloon 
Common  and  your  Smoke  Preferred  and 
substitute  government  bonds  therefor. 
And  still  you  wonder  at  crime. 

But  if  you  really  want  to  know  the 
meaning  of  the  terms  "marble  heart"  and 
"icy  eye,"  go  into  one  of  these  refrigerating 
plants  for  a  loan  when  money  is  tight.  It 
is  prudent  at  such  times  to  wear  ear-muffs 
and  red  mittens  fastened  together  by  tape 
so  they  can't  be  lost,  for  you  will  need  'em. 
As  soon  as  you  reach  the  outer  air — which 
will  be  in  about  a  second — run  home  and 
plunge  the  extremities  in  hot  water,  and 
place  a  porous  plaster  on  what  remains 
of  your  self-esteem. 

Bankers  are  too  prone  to  judge  a  man  by 
his  appearance,  so  that  the  very  men  who 
need  money  most  have  the  hardest  work 
to  get  it.     They  are  apt,  especially  at  the 


Bank-Notes  105 

City  Bank,  to  discriminate  against  the 
feller  who  looks  rocky,  in  favour  of  the 
Rockefeller.  Clothes  do  not  make  the 
man.  If  they  did,  Hetty  Green  wouldn't 
be  where  she  is,  and  Russell  Sage  would  be 
in  the  Old  Ladies'  Home.  If  Uncle  Russell 
had  to  travel  on  his  shape,  he  never  would 
see  much  of  the  world  Yet  beneath  that 
ragged  coat  there  beats  a  heart  which  as 
a  beater  can't  be  beat — a  heart  as  true 
(so  the  Standard  Gas  people  say)  as  true 
as  steal. 

But,  after  all,  banks  and  trust  companies 
do  a  lot  of  good  in  a  quiet  way,  especially 
to  their  directors.  See  what  a  convenience 
some  of  our  trust  companies  have  been  to 
their  directors  of  late.  It  would  some- 
times be  mortifying  to  these  directors  to 
have  to  attempt  to  borrow  money  on  cer- 
tain securities  in  institutions  with  which 
they  were  not  connected,  because,  instead 


106  A  Few  Remarks 

of  getting  the  money,  they  might  get  six 
months. 

I  notice  that  the  Secretary  of  the  Treas- 
ury says  that  105  per  cent,  of  the  bank 
failures  are  occasioned  by  the  directors 
borrowing  all  the  funds  and  thoughtlessly 
neglecting  to  return  the  same.  This  is  not 
as  it  should  be.  Directors  should  be  satis- 
fied with  attending  meetings  and  trying 
to  look  sagacious  at  $10  per  look,  and  not 
selfishly  insist  upon  getting  away  with  all 
the  boodle.  Such  business  methods  are 
not  only  discouraging  to  the  stockholders 
and  annoying  to  the  depositors,  but 
remove  all  incentive  to  effort  from  the 
cashier  and  note  teller. 

Nor  do  I  think  that  any  man  should  be 
eligible  to  act  as  a  director  after  he  attains 
the  age  of  100  years.  The  hardships  are 
too  severe.  Sometimes  when  a  director,  in 
the  pursuit  of  his  duties,  has  to  examine  the 


Bank-Notes  107 

securities  of  a  bank,  he  is  liable  to  suddenly 
come  across  collaterals  the  sight  of  which 
may  bring  on  heart  failure. 

I  know  of  one  lovely  old  gentleman,  who 
examined  an  uptown  bank,  and  he  came 
in  contact  with  so  much  Ice,  common 
and  preferred,  that  he  got  severely  frost- 
bitten. I  say,  let  the  young  men  take  up 
the  heat  and  burden  of  the  day.  There  are 
lots  of  us  who  in  time  will  develop  into 
excellent  borrowers,  and  to  whom  a 
weekly  ten-dollar  gold  piece  will  be  as  was 
the  manna  to  the  children  of  Israel. 

You  all  know  my  address. 


MY  FIRST  CASE 


MY  FIRST  CASE 

I  WAS  a  member  of  the  bar  once  myself, 
but  am  now  trying  to  live  an  honest 
life.  It  was  no  fault  of  mine.  My  people 
had  an  idea  that  I  had  a  giant  intellect 
which  I  was  artfully  concealing,  and  that 
the  noble  profession  of  the  law  was  the 
one  in  which  I  could  cut  the  most  con- 
gealed aqua. 

And  so  I  studied  law,  but  not  to  the 
extent  of  unduly  straining  my  mind. 

Finally  I  went  up  to  Poughkeepsie  to 
stand  my  examination.  Two  questions 
were  propounded  to  me,  both  of  which  I 
answered  incorrectly,  and  so  amidst  wild 
enthusiasm  (on  my  part)  I  was  given  a 
diploma  and  let  loose  upon  a  cold,  clammy 
and  unappreciative  community, 
in 


ii2  A   Few  Remarks 

I  was  frequently  assured  that  there  was 
plenty  of  room  at  the  top,  but  I  didn't 
find  it  so;  and  as  for  the  bottom — well, 
there  wasn't  even  standing-room  down 
there  ! 

I  distinctly  remember  my  first  case. 

It  is  easy  to  remember  my  cases,  as  they 
were  not  numerous.  It  was  entitled  "Scully 
vs.  the  Canal-boat  Hottentot."  Scully 
was  the  proprietor  of  a  pair  of  fiery,  un- 
tamed mules,  which,  at  the  time  herein- 
after mentioned,  were  bounding  joyously 
along  attached  to  a  canal-boat  going  east, 
upon  the  pellucid  waters  of  the  Erie  Canal. 
My  memory  is  not  clear  whether  the  waters 
were  pellucid  or  opaque,  but  that  is  imma- 
terial, irrelevant  and  incompetent  anyhow. 

Suddenly  there  loomed  up,  coming 
with  lightning  speed  from  the  opposite 
direction,  the  canal-boat  Hottentot,  like- 
wise  propelled   by   a  team  of  two-mule 


My  First  Case  1 1 3 

power.  My  clients  were  the  mules  first 
mentioned,  or  rather  their  owner,  to  wit, 
Scully.  You  must  excuse  me  if  I  get  my 
client  mixed  up  with  the  mules,  but  it  is 
pretty  hard  to  distinguish  a  man,  who  was 
jackass  enough  to  be  my  client,  from  a 
mule.  Well — Scully  was  my  client.  It 
was  rough  on  Scully,  but  somebody  had 
to  be  my  first  client. 

As  the  two  canal-boats  approached 
each  other,  my  client  dropped  his  tow- 
rope  so  it  would  go  under  the  keel  of  the 
Hottentot,  but,  unfortunately,  something 
was  loose  down  there ;  the  rope  caught, 
and  my  clients — the  aforesaid  mules — 
were  jerked  into  the  canal,  and  with  a 
gurgling  sigh  they  sank  into  the  pellucid 
or  opaque  (whichever  it  was)  depths, 
and  stayed  there  several  hours  before 
they  could  be  extricated,  and  when  at  last 
they    were    extricated    life    was     extinct. 


H4  A  Few  Remarks 

It  was  a  very  sad  case !  I  was  deeply 
touched.  My  client  was  also  touched, 
but  not  deeply.  I  only  touched  him  for 
ten  dollars. 

I  brought  suit  in  admiralty,  libeled 
the  Hottentot,  and  the  case  came  up  before 
Judge  Blatchford.  You  all  remember 
Judge  Blatchford — amiable,  docile,  pa- 
tient, gentle,  sentimental  Judge  Blatch- 
ford !  I  remember  starting  in  to  open 
the  case.  I  thought  I  had  a  good  case, 
and  as  I  drew  an  affecting  picture  of  my 
clients — the  mules — one  moment  so  full 
of  life  and  so  empty  of  oats,  surcharged 
with  the  infectious  mirth  and  gaiety  so 
characteristic  of  mules  on  the  tow-path; 
the  next  moment  struggling  for  life  in 
the  dark,  murky,  pellucid  or  opaque 
waters  of  the  canal,  I  thought  the  Judge 
would  be  moved — and  he  was.  But  he 
wasn't  moved  the  way  I  wanted  him  to  be. 


My  First  Case  115 

I  forget  whether  he  cast  aside  the  judicial 
ermine  and  came  down  off  the  bench  to 
get  at  me,  or  simply  threw  things  at  me 
from  where  he  was,  but  the  next  thing  I 
remember  I  was  hiding  in  my  cellar  in 
Brooklyn  waiting  for  Scully  to  leave  the 
city. 

That  case  disgusted  me  with  the  law. 
I  said  to  myself :  ' '  What  is  the  use  of 
my  staying  in  this  business  and  crowding 
out  Evarts  and  Abe  Hummel  and  putting 
out  Joe  Choate's  lights — men  who  have 
families  dependent  on  them  for  support? 
I  will  go  higher.  I  will  go  into  some 
business  where  a  man  with  a  three-ply 
intellect   will  be   appreciated." 

By  this  hasty  action  on  my  part  the 
Bar  was  deprived  of  one  of  its  brightest 
jewels. 

My   family   physician   has  been   trying 


ii6  A  Few  Remarks 

to  lift  a  mortgage  which  has  been  perching 
upon  his  residence,  and  what  little  time  I 
could  get  away  from  him  I  have  had  to 
devote  to  the  engrossing  occupation  of 
attending  on  supplementary  proceedings, 
so  I  have  had  to  rather  neglect  my  literary 
work  of  late. 

This  physician  persuaded  me  to  start 
a  garden,  but  whether  from  philanthropic 
motives  or  because  he  lives  next  door  and 
keeps  hens,  I  have  not  yet  determined. 
He  said,  if  I  would  get  out  early  every 
monvng  and  irritate  the  garden  with  a 
hoe,  while  the  cool,  fresh  breezes  fanned 
my  brow,  it  would  have  a  benign  and 
mellowing  effect  upon  my  liver.  He  also 
volunteered  to  supply  me  with  watermelon 
and  cucumber  seed.  Also  cuttings  from 
his  favourite  flower — the  night-blooming 
hypodermic  syringa.  Poor  trusting  fool, 
I  listened  to  his  honeyed  words.     I  raised 


My  First  Case  117 

a  large  crop  of  watermelons,  cucumbers, 
blisters  and  chills  and  fever.  The  latter, 
especially,  grew  and  flourished  with  great 
luxuriance.  Over  the  cucumbers  and 
watermelons  I  will  draw  the  veil.  Suffice 
it  that  it  was  a  busy  summer  for  my 
physician,  and  soon  the  mortgage  herein- 
before referred  to  was  transferred  from 
his  house  to  mine. 

He  was  wont  to  drop  in  on  me  two  or 
three  times  a  day  at  three  dollars  a  drop, 
and  he  would  hold  a  caucus,  or  perhaps 
it  would  be  better  to  call  it  a  mass  meeting 
— a  blue-mass  meeting — and  he  would 
smoke  my  twenty-five  cent  cigars  while  I 
would  sit  by  with  a  cynical  smile  and  a 
clinical  thermometer  on  my  Kps. 

In  the  fall  he  gave  me  the  freedom  of 
his  graperies,  but  I  was  onto  him  by 
that  time,  and  firmly  grasping  my  ver- 
miform appendix  I  fled  from  his  presence. 


ON  WOMAN  AND  BLOOMERS 


ON  WOMAN  AND  BLOOMERS 

IT  seems  presumptuous  in  this  favoured 
land,  where  woman  reigns  supreme,  for 
a  poor,  weak,  downtrodden  man  to  rise  up 
and  try  to  get  a  word  in  edgeways  in  her 
behalf.  My  limited  knowledge  of  woman 
leads  me  to  believe  that  she  is  quite 
capable  of  speaking  for  herself,  early  and 
often,  morning,  noon  and  night — and 
especially  night— because  all  the  married 
men  will  agree  with  me  that  at  no  time 
does  woman  rise  to  such  sublime  heights 
of  eloquence  as  in  the  still  watches  of  the 
night,  when  her  poor,  overworked,  pa- 
tient husband  pursues  his  winding  way 
homeward,  and  endeavours  to  pick  the 
front-door  lock  with  a  blue  chip  which  he 
has  neglected  to  cash  in. 
121 


122  A  Few  Remarks 

The  time  has  been  when  woman  was 
looked  upon  as  man's  inferior,  and  it 
is  said  that  in  some  of  the  older  countries 
she  still  occupies  a  secondary  place,  but 
here  she  can  truly  say 

"  I'm  monarch  of  all  I  survey, 
My  right  there  is  none  to  dispute." 

And  although  she  does  not  yet  wear 
the  breeches,  she  is  certainly  progressing 
rapidly  in  that  direction,  and  it  won't  be 
long  before  we  men  will  have  to  sneak 
up  in  the  chilly  night  and  go  through  our 
wife's  bloomers  in  order  to  secure  the 
wherewithal  to  pay  the  household  expenses. 
I  was  in  Boston  this  winter.  You 
know  the  ladies  greatly  outnumber  the 
men  down  there,  and  a  truly  modest  man 
hates  to  go  about  without  a  chaperon. 
I  got  on  a  trolley-car  filled  with  ladies. 
I  was  the  only  male  passenger,  and  being 
of   a    shy    and   shrinking   nature,    I   was 


On  Woman  and  Bloomers  123 

in  quite  a  nutter  for  fear  some  bold 
female  would  stare  at  me.  But,  strange 
as  it  may  seem,  not  one  of  them  so 
much  as  looked  at  me,  or  even  offered 
me  a  seat.  As  I  stood  with  averted 
gaze,  my  eye  was  attracted  by  a  sign  in 
the  car  which  read,  "Half  the  people  in 
this  car  are  wearing  Bunker  Hill  pants." 
That  statement  was  incorrect,  but  it  was 
the  voice  of  prophecy. 

While  on  the  subject  of  bloomers  I 
will  take  advantage  of  the  fact  that  the 
ladies  are  where  they  can't  talk  back,  to 
say  that  I  am  rejoiced  to  see  that  bloomers 
in  New  York  are  ceasing  to  bloom.  I 
have  but  one  objection  to  them.  I  admit 
they  are  healthful  (I  speak  from  hearsay), 
as  well  as  sensible  and  comfortable,  and 
they  may  be  the  coming  garb,  but  certainly 
not  the  becoming  garb.  To  the  married 
man,  who  is  sometimes  commissioned  to 


124  A  Few  Remarks 

go  into  the  closet  and  fetch  his  wife's 
purse,  which  he  is  to  find  in  the  pocket  of 
her  pink  wrapper,  any  simplification  of 
female  attire  might  seem  welcome,  but 
we  draw  the  line  at  bloomers.  We  don't 
mind  being  tied  to  a  woman's  apron- 
strings,  but  we'd  hate  like  thunder  to  be 
hitched  to  her  suspenders.  Bloomers  may 
be  all  right  to  strike  matches  on,  but  the 
girls  will  find  they  are  mighty  poor  things 
to  make  matches  in. 

Ladies,  be  as  rational  as  you  will,  and 
divide  your  skirts  or  reef  them,  or  fly  them 
at  half-mast  if  necessary,  but  I  beg  of  you, 
do  not  give  up  the  petticoat  quite  yet — 
that  white  banner  which,  when  flung  to 
the  breeze,  is  the  standard  about  which 
every  true  man  will  rally  to  do  your 
lightest  bidding. 

I  glory  in  the  emancipation  of  woman, 
and  I  do  not  grumble  when  asked  to  stay 


On  Woman  and  Bloomers  125 

at  home  and  mind  the  baby  while  my  wife 
goes  bicycling,  but  when  urged  to  act  as 
chief  engineer  of  a  baby  carriage,  I  am 
liable  to  murmur  and  repine  and  get  balky. 
There  are  some  avocations  which  the 
proud  and  haughty  spirit  of  man  will  not 
brook,  and  propelling  a  perambulator  is 
one  of  them — unless  he  happens  to  live  in 
Brooklyn,  where  this  sport  is  quite  the 
rage.  I  met  a  friend  over  there  once 
wheeling  a  young  female  girl  of  tender 
years,  and  when  I  rallied  him  about  it 
he  said,  "I've  got  a  good  thing  in  this 
baby  carriage,  and  when  I  have  a  good 
thing  I  believe  in  pushing  it  along. ' ' 

Still,  I  think  we  ought  to  help  our 
wives  more  in  the  care  of  the  children. 
When  the  baby,  for  instance,  awakens  in 
the  dead  of  the  night,  as  is  the  custom 
of  babes,  and  proceeds  to  lift  up  its  pre- 
maturely developed  voice  and  make  Rome 


126  A  Few  Remarks 

howl,  it  isn't  quite  the  fair  thing  for  the 
male  parent  to  utter  a  snort  of  rage  and 
bury  his  head  under  the  pillow.  Rather 
let  him  rise  up  and  take  the  little  one 
with  the  abnormal  vocal  accomplishments 
tenderly  in  his  arms,  and,  crooning  some 
low,  sweet  lullaby,  walk  up  and  down  for 
some  forty  or  fifty  miles,  ever  and  anon 
stepping  on  a  carpet-tack  or  taking  a 
fall  out  of  the  rocking-chair,  and  he  will 
find,  after  a  few  hours,  that  the  babe  will 
fall  into  a  sweet  slumber,  if  the  father 
doesn't  happen  to  fall  dead  first.  By 
little  acts  of  kindness  like  this  we  can 
greatly  endear  ourselves  to  our  wives,  and 
also  permit  them  to  sleep  soundly  and 
store  up  the  requisite  strength  to  attend 
bargain  sales  and  pink  teas  on  the  morrow. 
However,  "with  all  their  faults  we  love 
them  still."  We  may  poke  fun  at  them  or 
take  on  ill-fitting  airs  of  superiority  over 


On  Woman  and  Bloomers  127 

them,  but  down  deep  in  our  hearts  we 
know  that  all  that  makes  life  worth  living 
for  us  comes  from  the  love  and  devotion 
of  good  women.  They  make  the  world 
brighter  and  better  and  purer  and  sweeter. 
God  bless  them  alL 


A  EULOGY  OF  SIR  HENRY  IRVING 


A  EULOGY  OF  SIR  HENRY  IRVING 

A  SOBER,  able-bodied  eulogizer  with 
a  good  address  and  a  boiled  shirt 
can  get  a  pretty  steady  winter's  job 
at  the  Lotos  Club  at  board  wages.  I 
have,  in  my  poor,  weak  way,  eulogized 
several  distinguished  men  here,  all  of 
whom,  I  am  happy  to  say,  are  now 
convalescent.  I  eulogized  Joe  Choate, 
and  he  got  a  job  at  the  Court  of  St. 
James;  I  eulogized  Horace  Porter,  and 
he  is  now  playing  one-night  stands  at 
the  Moulin  Rouge;  Doctor  Depew,  and 
he  not  only  got  sent  to  Washington, 
but  got  a  raise  of  wages  at  the  Grand 
entral  Depot. 

The  only  man  who  really  appreciated 
my    efforts    was    dear    old  Joe  Jefferson. 
131 


132  A  Few  Remarks 

When  I  gave  him  to  understand  that  I 
was  anxious  to  see  him  in  one  of  his 
matchless  characterizations  he  inquired 
if  I  had  a  family  that  shared  my  anxiety, 
and  when  informed  that  I  had,  he  gener- 
ously tendered  all  hands  a  pass  to  the 
family  circle.  The  Lord  loves  a  cheerful 
giver,  but  the  Lord  help  any  one  who 
strikes  Joe  for  a  free  pass ! 

I  can  understand  that  the  life  of  an  actor 
must  be  a  trying  one,  and  success  difficult 
to  achieve,  and  it  must  be  a  source  of  great 
gratification  to  Sir  Henry  to  feel  that  he 
has  done  so  much  to  elevate  the  stage  as 
well  as  the  price  of  admission.  But  he 
deserves  success,  and  the  last  time  I  gave 
up  $3  to  behold  him,  and  afterward,  with 
a  lot  of  enthusiasts,  took  his  horses  from 
his  carriage  and  dragged  him  in  triumph 
two  miles  to  his  hotel,  I  really  felt  that  I 
had  had  a  run  for  my  money. 


A  Eulogy    of   Sir   Henry   Irving  133 

But  if,  Sir  Henry,  in  gratitude  for  this 
beautiful  tribute,  you  should  feel  tempted 
to  reciprocate  by  taking  my  horses  from 
my  carriage  and  dragging  me  in  triumph 
through  the  streets,  I  beg  that  you  will 
restrain  yourself,  for  two  reasons :  the  first 
reason  is,  that  I  have  no  horses:  the  second 
is,  that  I  have  no  carriage. 


CROCKERY 


CROCKERY 

CROCKERY  and  hotels  are  allied  in- 
dustries. So  long  as  there  are  two 
hundred  hotels  in  New  York  City  to  break 
china  the  crockery  business  must  nourish. 

Were  it  not  for  the  breakage  of  crockery, 
the  hotel  man  might  have  a  show. 

But  how  we  do  smash  it !  You  recall 
Tennyson's  poem  beginning  "Break,  break, 
break  !' '  Alfred  must  have  been  stopping 
in  a  hotel  when  he  penned  that  line,  so 
fraught  with  joyousness  to  the  crockery 
man,  so  fraught  with  sadness  to  the 
hotel   man.  I    have    always    suspected 

that  the  employees  of  hotels  are  in  league 
with  the  crockery  dealers.  Talk  about  a 
"Bull  in  a  China  shop"  !  It  is  nothing 
137 


138  A  Few  Remarks 

to  an  able-bodied  adult  female  Irish  lady 
in  a  hotel  pantry. 

You  have  all  noticed  "The  Pottery  on 
the  Hotel  Table."  When  you  first  glance 
at  your  plate  you  are  in  doubt  whether 
it  is  really  a  plate  or  a  circular  saw,  owing 
to  the  nicks  on  the  edge.  On  closer 
examination,  however,  you  will  probably 
find  that  it  is  one  of  Straus's  rolled-edge 
non-chippable  plates.  You  also  notice  in 
the  bottom  of  the  plate  something  which 
looks  like  a  Herald  war-map.  This  is  owing 
to  the  fact  that  it  is  of  French  china  made 
in  Trenton,  New  Jersey,  and  warranted 
not  to  check  or  star.  At  Carlsbad  I  was 
shown  some  elastic  china  which  wouldn't 
break  if  dropped  on  the  floor,  but  I 
understand  the  man  who  tried  to  intro- 
duce it  into  this  country  was  pushed  over 
Niagara  Falls  to  join  the  scoundrel  who 
gave  away  the  secrets  of  Masonry. 


Crockery  139 

Of  course  you  will  have  your  little 
jokes  and  call  crockery  by  the  playful 
misnomers  of  "iron  china,"  "stone  china," 
"  graniteware, "  and  the  like,  but  all  the 
same  I  notice  that  it  grows  more  and  more 
brittle  every  year;  and  the  crockery  man 
gets  richer  and  richer,  and  the  hotel  man 
gets  poorer  and  poorer,  so  that  the 
income  tax  hath  for  him  no  terrors;  and 
the  Irish  lady  crieth  "Ha,  Ha!"  as  with 
ghoulish  glee  she  merrily  clatters  and 
chips  and  bangs  and  busts  and  breaks 
and  smashes. 

And  as  for  hotel  waiters,  the  waiter 
who  lacks  the  gymnastic  ability  to  pre- 
cipitate himself  head  first  down  a  flight  of 
stairs  with  a  trayful  of  china  in  either 
hand  is  looked  upon  by  his  associates  in 
crime  as  a  mere  tyro. 

The  hall-boy,  too!  Much  of  a  hall- 
boy's  life  is  spent  in  the  futile  attempt  to 


140  A  Few  Remarks 

force  a  cube  of  ice  eight  inches  in  diameter 
into  a  crockery  pitcher  four  inches  in 
diameter.  What  is  the  consequence? 
The  crockery  man  goes  as  Ambassador 
to  Turkey,  or  is  permitted  to  spurn 
the  office  of  Mayor  of  the  City  of  New- 
York,  while  the  hotel  man  hastily  packs 
his  belongings  in  a  collar-box  and  moves 
over  to  the  poorfarm. 

Even  our  wTives  stand  in  with  you. 
Once  let  a  woman  become  a  victim  of  the 
crockery  habit  and  her  husband  might  as 
well  hang  out  the  red  flag  at  once.  Most 
of  our  happy  homes  are  so  replete  with 
bric-a-brac  and  china  that  in  order  to 
turn  around  with  safety  the  man  of  the 
house  is  compelled  to  go  out  in  the  back 
yard. 

I  have  always  regretted  that  I  did  not 
stick  to  the  crockery  business  myself. 
A  business  in  which  it  is  only  necessary 


Crockery  141 

to  mark  an  article  in  plain  figures  "$1.98, 
reduced  from  $2"  in  order  to  throw  the 
entire  female  population  into  a  condition 
of  nervous  hysteria,  and  to  cause  them  to 
rise  up  in  a  body  and  desert  children, 
home  and  husband,  and  to  climb  up  one 
another's  backs  in  frantic  effort  to  secure 
that  article ;  such  a  trade  appeals  strongly 
to  my  business  acumen. 

I  have  noticed,  too,  the  insidious  way 
in  which  the  crockery  man  is  gradually 
absorbing  all  other  business  enterprises. 
Let  a  dry  goods  dealer,  in  a  moment  of 
temporary  aberration  of  mind,  permit  a 
crockery  man  to  rent  a  small  space  in  his 
store,  and  his  name  is  Dennis.  That 
constitutes  what  might  be  termed  the 
entering  wedge.  You  remember  the 
fable  of  the  Arab  and  the  camel?  The 
A  nib  in  a  moment  of  weakness  per- 
mitted   the  camel  to  put  his  head  under 


142  A  Few  Remarks 

his  tent,  and  the  camel  "kept  a-pushin' 
and  a-shovin'"  until  he  got  his  whole 
body  in,  and  the  hospitable  Arab  was 
obliged  to  move  out  before  the  expiration 
of  his  lease;  which  proves  that  the  camel 
had  sand  and  push. 


ON  THE  AUTOMOBILE 


ON  THE  AUTOMOBILE 

I  READ  in  one  of  the  papers  which  shines 
for  all  at  two  cents  a  shine  a  day  or  two 
ago,  that  at  this  dinner  the  Honourable 
Job  Hedges  and  Simeon  Ford  would  "touch 
lightly  upon  the  automobile."  I  don't 
know  why  it  was  assumed  that  we  would 
touch  lightly  upon  the  automobile.  The 
Honourable  Job,  being  a  lawyer,  would, 
naturally,  "touch"  anything  he  came  in 
contact  with,  but  not  necessarily  lightly. 
I,  being  a  hotel-keeper,  get  touched  by  the 
public  right  along,  but  do  very  little  touch- 
ing myself.  My  business  is  melancholy, 
but  not  touching.  I  would  much  rather 
touch  lightly  on  the  automobile,  however, 
than  have  the  automobile  touch  lightly  on 
me.     And  that's  no  joke  ! 

145 


146  A  Few  Remarks 

Our  streets  have  always  been  hard 
enough  to  navigate,  heaven  knows,  but 
nowadays,  with  the  electric  trolleys  and 
the  automobiles  added,  pedestrianism  has 
degenerated  into  a  mere  succession  of 
frenzied  leaps  and  convulsive  stops,  and 
our  progress  to  and  fro  is  like  that  of  the 
startled  fawn,  which 

"  Bounds  from  crag  to  crag, 
Hearing  the  hunter's  horn." 

Shakespeare,  who  was  up  to  date  and  a 
little  ahead  of  it,  said : 

"  No  man  means  evil  but   the   devil,  and  we 
shall  know  him  by  his  horns." 

This  eternal  horn-blowing  is  a  nuisance 
and  a  nerve-destroying  crime,  and  is 
unnecessary  and  silly.  I  have  noticed  that 
the  smaller  the  auto  the  bigger  the  horn. 
To  hear  one  of  these  little  tin  washboilers, 
with  a  one-horse-power  engine  and  a 
twelve-horse-power  horn  and  a  twenty- 
mule-power     driver,     coming     down     the 


On  the  Automobile  147 

avenue,  you'd  suppose  that  Gabriel  with 
his  trump  had  broken  loose  at  last,  and 
when  you  look  up,  expecting  to  see  a 
trump,  you  see  nothing  but  a  two-spot. 

I  don't  claim  that  every  man  who  runs 
an  auto  is  a  jackass,  but  I  do  claim  that 
every  jackass  runs  an  auto.  I  run  one 
myself. 

But  when  I  run  over  a  pedestrian,  I 
just  mow  him  down  in  a  quiet,  dignified 
and  refined  manner,  and  don't  add  insult 
to  injury  by  frightening  him  to  death 
before  I  kill  him. 

I  am  an  automobilist,  not  from  choice, 
but  in  self-defense.  Some  achieve  auto- 
mobiles and  some  have  automobiles  thrust 
upon  them.  I  live  in  a  suburban  town 
which  was  early  seized  with  automo- 
biliousness  in  its  most  virulent  form. 
One  of  my  immediate  neighbours  bought 
a  machine  of  limited  capacity  for  every- 


148  A  Few  Remarks 

thing  but  noise.  Its  capacity  for  noise 
was  unlimited.  It  was  also  long  on  smell. 
At  first  the  rest  of  us  talked  of  tar  and 
feathers.  Some  of  us  thought  that  was 
too  mild  and  that  the  punishment  should 
fit  the  crime.  And  while  we  hesitated, 
we  all  got  the  craze,  and  now  we  are  all 
tarred  with  the  same  stick. 

This  was  my  daily  programme  for  a 
time :  I  would  start  to  drive  to  the 
station.  Presently  the  earth  would 
tremble,  my  horses  would  tremble,  my 
coachman  would  tremble,  and  I  would 
tremble  most  of  all,  and  with  rumblings 
and  snort ings  and  smells  indescribable, 
my  neighbour  would  dash  by.  I  would 
then  breathe  a  prayer,  disentangle  my 
horses  from  a  barbed-wire  fence,  pluck 
my  wagon  from  a  nearby  tree,  reconnect 
them,  and  proceed  on  my  way  rejoicing. 
Presently    I   would   overhaul   my   friend. 


On   the   Automobile  149 

He  and  his  chauffeur  would  be  reclining 
on  their  backs  under  the  auto,  doing  stunts 
with  spanners  and  monkey  wrenches.  I 
would  then  take  my  neighbour  into  my 
wagon,  drive  him  to  the  station,  and  his 
machine  would  wait  to  be  towed  home 
by  my  team. 

My  neighbour  argued  that  the  auto  was 
the  coming  mode  of  locomotion,  and  that 
the  horse  must  go.  I  agreed  with  the  latter 
proposition.  I  reminded  him  that  one 
of  my  best  horses,  hearing  his  approach, 
decided  that  he  must  go,  and  that  I 
thought  he  was  going  yet.  I  stayed  with 
him  awhile,  but  decided  he  was  too  swift  a 
proposition  for  me  to  keep  company  with. 
I  never  could  decide  whether  it  is  the 
appearance  of  the  machine,  or  the  smell,  or 
the  raiment  of  the  driver  that  gets  into  a 
horse's  nerves,  but  I  reckon  it's  the  rai- 
ment.    The  spiritual  description  of  the  Lily 


150  A  Few  Remarks 

of  the  Field  applies  to  them  pretty  well: 
"They  toil  not,  neither  do  they  spin,  but 
verily  I  say  unto  you  that  Solomon  in  all 
his  glory  was  not  arrayed  like  one  of 
these." 

The  first  machine  I  looked  at  was  small, 
simple  and  inexpensive.  It  had  but  one 
cylinder.  The  salesman  said  that  was  an 
advantage.  He  said  a  four-cylinder  engine 
would  get  out  of  order  four  times  as  often. 
This  machine  had  a  handle  on  the  side  like 
a  barrel-organ.  He  showed  me  how  to 
make  it  go  fast,  and  slow,  and  stop,  and 
start,  and  all  while  the  machine  stood 
in  the  store.  A  child  of  ten  years  could 
run  it,  he  said.  "  Now,  if  you  want  to  get 
out  of  a  tight  place,"  he  said,  "  get  a  sudden 
move  on — you  touch  this  lever  called  the 
accelerator." 

He  touched  it,  and  with  that  something 
went  wrong,  and  the  handle  I  have  alluded 


On  the  Automobile  151 

to  flew  around  and  smote  him  violently  in 
the  abdomen.  When  he  came  to  I  told 
him  a  child  of  ten  might  run  the  machine, 
but  the  child  would  have  to  have  a  very 
strong  stomach. 

Next,  a  friend  took  me  out  in  a  base- 
burning  steam  vehicle.  He  had  a  third 
man  with  him,  and  I  sat  behind  on  a  sort 
of  broiler  arranged  over  the  boiler.  The 
day  was  warm,  and  I  understood  at  once 
why  the  machine  was  called  a  "steamer. " 
I  felt  like  the  nigger  who  used  to  squat  on 
the  safety-valve  on  the  Mississippi  boats. 
I  amused  myself  by  watching  the  steam- 
gage  and  wondering  how  long  it  would 
take  me  to  come  down  if  anything  went 
wrong.  The  exhaust  steam  went  up  my 
trousers'  leg  and  I  felt  like  the  squid, 
which  scientists  say  envelops  itself  in  a 
cloud  or  fog  of  its  own  making  in  order 
to   conceal    itself   from   its   enemies.     My 


1 5  2  A  Few  Remarks 

friend,  meanwhile,  explained  the  mechan- 
ism, but  I  told  him  if  I  had  to  become  a 
master  mechanic  it  would  pay  me  better 
to  go  and  run  the  Kaiser  Wilhelm. 

The  consensus  of  opinion  seemed  to  be 
that  the  gasoline  machine  was  the  thing. 
There  was  power,  simple  and  direct !  It 
ran  by  a  series  of  explosions.  That  ap- 
pealed to  me  at  once.  That's  the  way  my 
hotel  on  Park  Avenue  has  been  run  during 
the  past  year — by  a  series  of  explosions 
of  dynamite  by  the  tunnel  people,  and  a 
series  of  explosions  of  profanity  on  the 
part  of  myself  and  my  few  remaining 
boarders. 

Every  auto  I  thought  of  buying  all  my 
friends  assured  me  was  no  good,  and  in  the 
light  of  subsequent  experiences  I  guess 
they  were  right.  Finally,  on  my  own 
responsibility,  I  bought  that  lovely  lobster- 
pink  creation  in  which  I  may  be  seen  'most 


On  the  Automobile  i53 

any  pleasant  day  now  running  merrily 
through  the  Park  or  street  and  anon  sitting 
reposefully  while  my  chauffeur,  assisted 
by  the  populace,  explores  the  vitals  of  the 
machine,  looking  for  trouble.  I  remember 
when  I  was  a  boy  I  saw  and  admired  at 
Barnum's  Museum  a  working  model  of  an 
engine  all  made  of  glass,  but  I  never 
dreamed  I  should  own  one. 

I  am  getting  proud  of  my  machine.  I 
think  it  holds  the  record  for  having  traveled 
fewer  miles  in  a  given  time  than  any  other 
yet  devised.  My  engine  will  break  when 
standing  motionless  on  the  barn  floor, 
simply  through  the  power  of  gravitation. 
It  is  operated  by  a  skilled  mechanic  and 
costs  me  as  much  per  month  as  it  would  to 
run  the  Corsair.  But  it  has  one  merit.  I 
never  wander  so  far  from  my  own  fireside 
but  that  I  can  easily  walk  back.  I  have 
worn  out  six  sets  of  hinges  in  the  hood 


*54  A  Few  Remarks 

peering    at    the    engine    to    see   what    is 
busted. 

I  used  to  get  up  and  help  the  chauffeur 
to  look,  until  one  day  when  we  were  both 
hidden  behind  the  hood  a  sneak  carried 
off  my  fur  robes.  Now  I  just  sit  back  and 
listen  to  the  jeers  of  the  populace  and  sigh 
to  think  of  the  happy  times  gone  by  when 
I  used  to  travel  on  the  street-cars  and  get 
to  my  destination  on  the  same  day. 


RULES   FOR   SUCCESS   IN   THE 
HOTEL   BUSINESS 


RULES   FOR   SUCCESS   IN  THE 
HOTEL   BUSINESS 

WHAT  a  change  has  come  over  the 
business  in  the  last  few  years ! 
I  read,  not  long  ago,  of  a  gentleman  who, 
returning  home  in  the  still  watches  of  the 
night,  found  a  man  slumbering  sweetly  on 
the  marble  floor  of  the  vestibule,  his  head 
pillowed  on  the  woven-wire  door-mat. 
When  aroused,  he  mumbled:  "Didn't  I 
leave  word  not  to  be  called  till  eight 
o'clock?  This  is  the  last  time  I'll  ever 
sleep  in  the  Ashland  House."  He  was 
one  of  the  old-fashioned  guests.  They 
didn't  expect  too  much.  Nowadays,  if 
you  lodge  a  man  for  a  dollar,  he  comes 
down  and  expostulates  if  he  hasn't  got  a 
hand-painted  piano  in  his  room. 

157 


158  A  Few  Remarks 

It  behooves  us  old-timers  to  get  a  "  quick 
Waterbury  movement"  on  us,  if  we  want 
to  keep  up  with  the  procession.  We  can't 
all  have  buildings  like  the  Savoy  and  the 
Waldorf  and  the  Holland ;  but  if  we  can't 
have  the  best  hotel,  let's  have  the  best 
hotel  we  can.  There  are  lots  of  old- 
fashioned  folks  left  in  the  world.  Lots  of 
people  wouldn't  feel  at  home  in  the 
Waldorf.  I  don't  believe  I  would  myself, 
although  I'd  like  to  get  a  chance  to  try. 
I've  often  thought  that  when  we  got  a  real 
good  year  again  I'd  save  and  scrimp  and 
deny  my  family  the  necessities  of  life,  and 
when  I  had  accumulated  a  sufficient  sum  I 
would  go  down  to  the  Waldorf  and  spend 
one  night  in  that  $4,000  bed.  I  would 
stretch  myself  luxuriously  amid  its  silken 
coverings,  and  I  would  say  to  myself, 
"Well,  am  I  in  it?"  But,  ah  me,  this  is 
but  a  dream.     If  the  royal  families  keep 


Rules  for  Hotel  Business  159 

on  putting  up  hotels,  I  am  more  likely  to 
wake  up  some  morning  over  in  the  hotel 
men's  dormitory  at  the  poorfarm. 

And  speaking  of  soap  reminds  me  that, 
in  my  opinion,  the  mainspring  of  success  in 
the  hotel  business  is  soap;  not  Lubin's 
Cashmere  Bouquet,  but  plain  yaller  soap, 
with  plenty  of  Hibernian  elbow  grease  ' '  on 
the  side."  Cleanliness  is  away  ahead  of 
godliness  in  our  business.  When  a  guest 
goes  into  a  hotel  dining-room,  and  has  to 
engage  in  a  hand-to-hand  struggle  with  a 
cockroach  for  the  possession  of  the  meal  he 
is  paying  for,  it  has  a  tendency  to  make 
him  morose  and  dissatisfied.  And  it 
should  be  a  fundamental  principle  with 
hotel  men  never  to  let  a  guest  escape 
dissatisfied. 

Should  you  inadvertently  chance  upon 
a  guest  in  the  act  of  absorbing  some 
trifling  article  of  silverware  or  bric-a-brac, 


160  A  Few  Remarks 

or  an  eight-day  clock,  or  a  pair  of  blankets, 
with  true  delicacy  turn  your  back  and 
affect  not  to  have  seen  him,  lest  he  be 
embarrassed,  bearing  in  mind  that  many 
travelers  take  an  innocent  delight  in 
gathering  about  them  little  souvenirs  to 
serve  as  pleasant  reminders  of  their  visits 
to  hotels.  It  is  always  a  source  of  gratifi- 
cation to  me  when  I  reflect  upon  the 
hundreds  of  happy  homes  which  I  have 
helped  to  beautify,  and  the  many  festive 
boards  throughout  the  land  which  are 
adorned  with  linen  and  flashing  silver 
inscribed  with  the  beautiful  motto,  "  Grand 
Union  Hotel." 

The  custom  common  in  hotel  wash- 
rooms of  attaching  the  hair-brushes  and 
combs  to  the  walls  by  means  of  chains  is  to 
be  deprecated.  It  is  far  better  to  allow 
these  implements  to  roam  at  large,  for  it 
is  galling  to  the  proud  spirit  of  a  free-born 


Rules  for  Hotel  Business  161 

American  to  have  to  perform  his  toilet 
accompanied  by  the  clanking  of  chains, 
and  it  also  puts  him  to  the  inconvenience 
and  expense  of  bringing  a  monkey  wrench 
with  him,  in  case  he  should  be  seized  with 
an  uncontrollable  desire  to  add  a  brush 
and  comb  to  his  collection.  The  average 
guest  has  about  as  much  regard  for  the 
rights  of  a  landlord  as  a  tomcat  for  the 
sanctity  of  the  marriage  rite,  and  anything 
in  a  hotel  which  is  not  screwed  to  the  floor 
is  usually  considered  in  the  light  of  legiti- 
mate prey.  And  knowing  this  little  eccen- 
tricity, we  must  humour  it. 

When  I  first  plunged  into  this  business  I 
had  a  foolish  notion  that  there  should  be 
rules  for  the  conduct  of  a  hotel,  and  that 
guests  should  be  expected  to  observe  them. 
In  consequence,  I  made  some  bad  breaks. 
I  remember  once  when  a  nice,  benevolent- 
looking  old  gentleman  had  registered,  and 


162  A  Few  Remarks 

was  about  to  go  to  his  room,  I  stepped  up 
to  him,  and  with  an  engaging  smile  I  said : 
"My  dear  sir,  pardon  me  for  addressing 
you,  but  from  the  hayseed  which  still 
lingers  lovingly  in  your  whiskers,  and  the 
fertilizer  which  yet  adheres  to  your  cheap 
though  serviceable  army  brogans,  I  hazard 
the  guess  that  you  are  an  agriculturist  and 
unaccustomed  to  the  rules  to  be  observed 
in  one  of  New  York's  palatial  caravansaries. 
Permit  me,  therefore,  to  suggest  that  upon 
retiring  to  your  sumptuous  $i  apartment 
you  refrain  from  blowing  out  the  gas,  as  is 
the  time-honoured  custom  of  the  residents 
of  the  outlying  districts,  but  turn  the  key, 
thus." 

He  glared  at  me,  and  went  his  way,  and 
I  noticed  that  the  clerk,  who  had  been 
standing  by,  had  broken  out  into  a  cold 
sweat. 

"Why,"  said  he,  "that  man  is  a  United 


Rules  for  Hotel  Business  163 

States  Senator  from  Kansas;  didn't  you 
notice  his  whiskers  ?  He  expected  to  stop 
at  the  Manhattan,  but  chancing  to  see  one 
of  their  advertisements,  observed  that  the 
Grand  Central  Depot  was  attached  to  the 
house,  and  he  was  afraid  the  locomotives 
would  break  his  rest,  so  he  came  down  to 
this  sequestered  nook  so  as  to  be  quiet,  and 
now  you  have  driven  him  away." 

"It  makes  no  difference  to  me  whether 
he  is  a  Senator  or  not,"  I  replied ;  "  I  am  no 
believer  in  class  distinctions.  We  cannot 
afford  to  give  any  man  a  room  for  $1  and 
have  him  absorb  $2  worth  of  illuminating 
gas.  The  veriest  tyro  at  financiering 
would  know  that  to  pursue  such  business 
methods  would  eventually  deplete  the  gold 
reserve." 

You  can't  be  too  particular  nowadays 
with  guests.  Whatever  they  want,  give  it 
to  them.     Whatever  else  you  may  be,  be 


164  A  Few  Remarks 

obliging  to  your  guests.  I  read  a  story 
in  The  Hotel  Gazette  last  week  which  illus- 
trates the  obliging  landlord  of  to-day. 

A  gentleman  was  stopping  at  a  little 
seaside  resort  kept  by  a  German.  One  day 
the  guest  went  into  the  ocean  to  bathe  and 
got  beyond  his  depth.  He  couldn't  swim, 
and  as  he  struggled  he  gave  a  loud  cry  for 
help.  The  German  landlord,  hearing  the 
cry,  came  out  on  the  veranda,  and  saw  his 
guest  just  disappearing  beneath  the  wave, 
and  as  he  sank  he  threw  up  one  despairing 
hand  with  ringers  outstretched.  The  land- 
lord went  back  into  the  house  and  brought 
out  five  beers. 


ON    POLICEMEN 


ON    POLICEMEN 

I  AM  proud  to  have  been  invited 
here,  and  glad  to  learn  that  you 
recognize  a  good  thing  when  you  see  it 
and  are  willing  to  push  it  along.  I  read 
to-day  in  a  Boston  paper,  under  the  head- 
ing of  "Mining  News,"  that  Coppers  have 
taken  a  big  drop.  I  have  known  some 
New  York  coppers  who  wouldn't  take  a 
drop  if  the  Statue  of  Liberty  fell  on  them. 
In  fact,  I  have  never  heard  of  a  New  York 
policeman  who  would  take  a  drop,  and 
I've  kept  a  bar  for  twenty  years.  But 
all  the  same,  I'm  glad  you've  dropped  to 
me. 

I  have  always  admired  the  New  York 
police,  and  consider  them  a  fine  body  of 
men,    and    I    love   to   see   them   enjoying 

167 


T68  A  Few  Remarks 

themselves.  Only  to-day,  as  I  walked 
down  Fifth  Avenue  and  noted  here  and 
there  groups  of  policemen  chatting  to- 
gether, and  apparently  so  merry  and 
well-fed  and  free  from  care,  while  rural 
visitors  were  freely  purchasing  gold 
bricks  from  long-lost  relatives  with  dyed 
mustaches,  I  could  not  but  think  that 
were  I  not  already  a  hotel-keeper  I  would 
like  to  be  a  policeman. 

And,  after  all,  our  trades  are  a  good 
deal  alike,  because  while  we  landlords  take 
in  the  public,  make  all  sorts  of  charges, 
and  give  them  the  combined  comforts  of 
home  and  the  club,  you  also  take  in  the 
public  on  all  sorts  of  charges  and  give 
them,  if  not  the  comforts  of  home,  at 
least  the  benefits  of  the  club;  and  that  is 
no  joke. 

But  you  have  one  advantage  over  us. 
When  you  take  in  a  boarder  you  generally 


On  Policemen  169 

know  how  long  he  is  to  be  with  you,  and 
if  he  has  any  kick  coming  about  southern 
exposure  or  noise  from  the  elevator  or  the 
odour  of  cooking  he  keeps  it  to  himself. 
But  the  self -convicted  criminals  who  stop 
with  us  never  hesitate  to  express  an 
adverse  opinion,  nor  to  leave  on  slight 
provocation;  so  that  the  landlord's  lot 
is  not  a  happy  one. 

But,  joking  aside,  where  is  there  a 
police  force  like  ours,  and  where  is  there 
another  city  where  a  man  or  woman  can 
go  anywhere,  at  any  time,  day  or  night, 
without  molestation?  It's  curious, 
though,  how  many  more  policemen  it 
takes  to  keep  order  at  the  Polo  Grounds 
when  there  is  a  match  on  between  the 
leading  nines  than  when  one  is  being  con- 
tested between  two  of  the  tail-enders. 
And  when  Terry  McGovern  goes  up  against 
the  "Coon,"  dozens  of  cops  are  required  to 


17°  A  Few  Remarks 

preserve  peace,  but  when  two  dubs  knock 
the  stuffing  out  of  each  other  you  can't 
find  a  bluecoat  with  a  searchlight;  which 
goes  to  prove  that  our  police  have  good 
taste  as  well  as  courage. 

Speaking  of  courage,  too,  it  takes  nerve 
for  a  policeman  four  feet  in  diameter  to 
stand  between  two  cable-cars  three  feet 
apart  going  in  opposite  directions  at  ten 
miles  an  hour.  Why  police  captains 
always  select  the  fattest  policemen  to 
stand  between  cars  I  never  could  under- 
stand, unless  it  is  that  they  don't  want  the 
cars  to  get  too  close  together ;  or  else  they 
have  to  keep  their  thin  men  up  at  the 
Heine  fountain  to  sprint  after  people  who 
are  trying  to  remove  souvenirs  from  that 
work  of  art  with  the  aid  of  a  dark  lantern 
and  a  pick-ax. 


AFTER-DINNER  SPEAKERS 


AFTER-DINNER  SPEAKERS 

PERHAPS  you  think  after-dinner 
speakers,  like  game  and  cheese, 
improve  with  age;  but  even  game  and 
cheese  can't  be  kept  in  cold  storage  too 
long  without  getting  a  little  decollette. 

You  are  all  familiar  with  the  poem  from 
"Mother  Goose"  beginning: 

"Little  Tommy  Tucker 
Sang  for  his  supper." 

Well,  Tommy  was  in  luck.  For,  having 
sang  for  his  supper,  it  is  fair  to  presume 
that  he  got  it  and  was  able  to  eat  it  with 
a  relish.  But  we  latter-day  Tommy 
Tuckers  get  our  supper  first,  when  our 
speech  is  sticking  in  our  throats  so  we 
can't  eat,  and  then  have  to  sing  for  it 
afterward.     If  we  could  only  speak  first 

173 


174  A  Few  Remarks 

and  eat  afterward,  how  we  would  relish 
our  victuals. 

There  are  three  species  of  guest.  One, 
the  fortunate  being  who  is  invited  solely 
to  eat,  drink  and  be  merry  at  some  other 
fellow's  expense.  Another  the  gifted 
being  who  travels  on  his  shape  and  who 
by  reason  of  his  greatness  is  invited  to 
throw  a  halo  of  respectability  over  the 
occasion.  And  last,  the  distinguished 
yet  unhappy  orator,  who  has  to  work 
his  passage.  To  the  former  I  present 
my  felicitations;  to  the  latter  my 
heartfelt  sympathy. 

Years  ago,  in  one  of  my  rare  lucid  inter- 
vals, I  made  a  speech  which,  surprising 
as  it  may  seem,  was  regarded  as  a  gem. 
Up  to  that  time  I  had  been  a  merry, 
laughter-loving  youth,  and  carking  care 
rested  lightly  upon  my  clustering  curls. 
Now  look  at  me.     Gaze  upon  this  coun- 


After-Dinner  Speakers  175 

tenance,  "Sicklied  o'er  with  the  pale  cast 
of  thought,"  and  this  wasted  form,  filled 
with  high  resolve  and  pepsin  tablets,  and 
pause  ere  it  is  too  late.  Become  an  opium 
eater  if  you  will,  a  drunkard,  or  sink  lower 
still  and  become  a  cigarette  smoker  if 
you  must,  but  never,  never  contract  the 
after-dinner  speaking  habit. 

After-dinner  oratory  is  a  curious  busi- 
ness— painful,  but  apparently  necessary. 
Severe  on  you,  but  worse  on  us.  To  see 
us  up  here  bursting  with  suppressed 
eloquence,  you  might  think  we  have  a 
cinch,  but  such  is  not  the  case.  I  know  of 
no  class  of  men  who  work  harder  and  get 
work  oftener  than  us  orators.  Some  few 
orators  really  enjoy  speaking,  but  they  are 
men  without  any  sense  of  shame.  Chauncey 
Depew  says  that  he  fairly  dotes  on  after- 
dinner  speaking.  As  for  me,  I  am  free  to 
say  that  I  would  rather  be  the  humblest 


i';6  A  Few  Remarks 

bank  president  among  you,  and  sit  down 
and  relish  my  victuals,  than  be  up  here  in 
the  fierce  light  which  beats  upon  the  head 
table,  and  get  my  dinner  for  nothing  and 
have  lovely  ladies  nearly  tumble  out  of  the 
boxes  as  they  hang  upon  my  slightest 
word. 

The  idea  generally  obtains  that  all  an 
after-dinner  speaker  has  to  do  is  to  assume 
a  dress  suit  and  an  engaging  smile,  rise  up 
when  called  upon,  and  captivate  an  audi- 
ence with  wit  or  eloquence,  born  of  the 
moment  and  inspired  by  the  surround- 
ings. This  is  largely  the  fault  of  the 
speakers  themselves,  who  spend  most  of 
their  allotted  time  jollying  the  listeners 
into  the  idea  that  the  call  is  unexpected 
and  the  speech  spontaneous. 

This  is  not  only  untrue,  but  it  robs  the 
orator  of  the  credit  which  is  his  due.  How 
much  more  honest  it  would  be  if  he  would 


After-Dinner  Speakers  177 

admit  that  for  one  or  two  long,  sickening 
weeks  his  speech  has  been  rankling  in  his 
vitals;  and  that  for  'most  as  long  his 
innocent  wife  and  children  have  been  made 
wretched  by  having  to  listen  to  rehearsals 
thereof ;  that  he  has  aroused  suspicions  as  to 
his  sanity  by  muttering  it  in  public  places, 
and  has  been  shadowed  by  the  police  as 
he  patrolled  lonely  streets  at  night  address- 
ing imaginary  after-dinner  audiences. 

Some  bold  diners-out  have  recently 
tried  to  break  over  the  ancient  custom 
of  after-dinner  speaking  by  substituting 
for  us  orators,  who  make  a  specialty  of 
clothing  our  thoughts  in  beautiful  and 
felicitous  phrases,  soubrettes  who,  it  is 
said,  do  not  bother  about  clothing  at  all. 
It  is  awful  to  think  that  we  are  to  be  thus 
brought  directly  into  competition  with 
living  pictures  and  skirt-dancers  and 
Little  Egypts.     What  show  would  Horace 


1 78  A  Few  Remarks 

Porter  have  if  he  had  to  go  up  against 
the  couchee  couchee !  And  even  Joe 
Choate  couldn't  expect  to  draw  against 
such  drawers  as  the  Barrison  Sisters. 
Where  would  I  come  in,  arrayed  in  my 
simple  dress  suit  and  unpretentious  jag, 
against  Cissie  Fitzgerald  in  her  naughty 
wink  and  openwork  tights !  And  what 
possible  chance  would  our  Chauncey  have 
— peach  though  he  be — against  those  over- 
ripe Cherry  Sisters !  Why,  he'd  simply 
be  fruit  for  'em. 

However,  let  a  man  keep  at  after-dinner 
speaking  long  enough  and  he  will  get 
softening  of  the  brain,  and  either  land  in 
the  Cabinet  or  some  big  public  office,  or  in  a 
lunatic  asylum.  Mr.  Depew  landed  in  the 
United  States  Senate,  but  it  was  a  toss-up 
where  he  should  be  sent.  Horace  Porter 
is  Minister  to  France,  Joe  Choate  is  tossing 
verbal  nosegays  at  King  Edward,  several 


After-Dinner  Speakers  179 

gentlemen  present  this  evening  have  got 
lucrative  jobs  under  the  government ;  but 
cheer  up !  Me  and  St.  Clair  McKelway 
are  still  at  large. 


ON  THE  GAME  OF  GOLF 

AN  ADDRESS  MADE  AT 
THE  DINNER  OF  THE  DYKER  MEADOW  GOLF  CLUB 
OF  BROOKLYN.  N.  Y. 


ON  THE  GAME  OF  GOLF 

["  HAD  hoped  to  meet  my  rival,  Walter 
J.  Travis,  the  champion  golfer,  here 
this  evening,  so  as  to  take  an  oratorical 
fall  out  of  him.  I  think  he  defaulted, 
fearing  I  would  have  him  down.  I  think 
I  am  better  at  bawling  a  golf  address  than 
at  addressing  a  golf  ball. 

He  and  I  are  excellent  examples  of 
absolutely  different  styles,  each  model  in 
its  way.  The  peculiarity  of  his  style  con- 
sists in  his  exasperating  habit  of  always 
getting  his  ball  into  the  cup  in  one  stroke 
less  than  his  adversary.  My  style,  on  the 
contrary,  is  of  the  "After  you,  my  dear 
Alphonse, "  type. 

He  is  self-taught,  defies  all  precepts, 
examples,  and  traditions,  and  by  methods 
peculiarly  his  own  generally  manages  to 
183 


184  A  Few  Remarks 

get  there.  I  represent  the  combined 
efforts  and  wisdom  of  many  masters  and 
much  literature,  but  never  really  cut 
loose  until  the  match  is  over  and  I  am 
licked,  and  find  myself  in  the  nineteenth 
hole,  setting  them  up  as  heretofore  for  the 
assembled  multitude. 

To  improve,  if  possible,  my  game  I 
visited  Scotland  this  summer.  Scotland 
is  about  as  near  Heaven  as  a  golfer  may 
ever  hope  to  get.  The  language  engen- 
dered by  the  royal  and  ancient  game  is 
such  as  to  preclude  all  hope  of  a  cool  and 
peaceful  hereafter,  as  you  perhaps  know. 

If  I  had  my  choice  of  a  future  life,  and  it 
lay  between  the  golden  streets  and  the 
gates  of  pearl  and  jasper  and  the  St. 
Andrews  links,  it  wouldn't  take  me  long 
to  decide.  Bad  as  my  work  is  with  the 
iron,  I  believe  my  performance  on  the 
harp  would  be  even  less  satisfactory. 


On  the  Game  of  Golf  185 

I  admire  our  little  friend,  Andy  Carnegie, 
for  going  back  to  settle  in  Scotland.  It 
certainly  has  Pittsburg  lashed  to  the  mast. 
I  did  not  visit  Andrew  while  there,  owing 
to  circumstances  over  which  I  had  no 
control,  but  I  am  told  he  has  a  neat,  if 
unostentatious,  place  at  Skibo,  advantage- 
ously located  on  the  corner  of  Easy  Street, 
where  he  enjoys  the  fruits  of  his  labours  as 
well  as  some  of  mine. 

Far  be  it  from  me  to  call  undue  atten- 
tion to  this  gentleman  who  so  shrinks 
from  public  notice,  but  I  must  give  him 
credit  for  giving  up  work  at  so  early  an 
age  and  retiring  on  a  modest  competence, 
instead  of  struggling  along,  as  me  and  John 
D.  Rockefeller  do,  to  amass  a  vast  fortune, 
when  we  might  better  devote  our  declining 
years  to  perfecting  our  follow  through. 

After  the  strenuous  life  he  has  led  it 
must  be  a  great  joy  to  retire  to  his  moun- 


1 86  A  Few  Remarks 

tain  fastness,  don  his  kilts,  take  his  bag- 
pipes under  his  arm,  gird  on  his  claymore, 
lower  the  portcullis,  and  sally  forth  upon 
the  heather  "in  maiden  meditation  fancy 
free"  to  scatter  aphorisms  and  public 
libraries  broadcast  over  the  land  that  gave 
him  birth  and  nothing  else  worth  men- 
tioning. 

Of  course,  I  made  straightway  for  St. 
Andrews.  It  is  not  true  that  the  town 
was  named  after  Mr.  Carnegie.  It  was 
there,  history  says,  that  St.  Regulus  was 
shipwrecked  with  the  bones  of  St.  Andrew, 
who  thereupon  became  the  patron  saint 
of  Scotland.  It  does  not  say  why  Reg. 
was  traveling  with  the  bones,  but  perhaps 
he  was  an  end  man  in  a  minstrel  troupe, 
or  he  may  have  been  playing  cards  on 
shipboard  and  had  occasion  to  go  back  to 
the  boneyard.  Anyhow,  he  had  a  few 
bones  with  him  when  he  landed,  and  as  the 


On  the  Game  of  Golf  187 

place  is  rather  expensive  it  was  a  wise 
precaution. 

The  chief  industry  of  St.  Andrews  con- 
sists of  hitting  golf  balls  by  day  and  high 
balls  by  night,  and  by  constant  practice 
the  natives  have  become  very  proficient 
at  both  pastimes.  The  Scotch  are  famous 
for  possessing  a  peculiar  form  of  dry 
humour.  Some  say  it  comes  from  eating 
too  much  oatmeal,  and  that  may  be  the 
reason  why  so  many  of  them  are  scratch 
men.  I  noticed  it  myself  while  there. 
I  don't  think  I  was  any  more  humorous 
than  usual,  but  I  was  much  drier.  I  was 
dry  all  the  time. 

For  all  I  was  so  dry,  Scotland  impressed 
me  as  possessing  a  very  damp,  water- 
logged kind  of  climate.  If  the  natives 
knew  enough  to  go  in  when  it  rained  they 
would  get  very  little  outdoor  exercise. 
I  am  told  that  the  only  water  consumed 


1 88  A  Few  Remarks 

there  by  the  adult  male  population  is  ab- 
sorbed through  the  pores.  Travellers  not 
inured  to  the  rigours  of  the  climate  are 
advised  by  the  guide-books  to  partake 
of  a  little  stimulant  occasionally — say 
every  twenty  minutes.  By  this  simple 
precaution  pneumonia  may  be  avoided 
and  a  delicious  sensation  of  warmth  and 
delirium  tremens  imparted.  The  guide- 
book further  says  that  whisky  taken  in 
small  quantities,  diluted,  will  be  found  a 
good  drink  for  pedestrians.  That  did  not 
coincide  with  my  experience.  Instead  of 
aiding,  I  found  that  it  interfered  with 
pedestrianism.  But  perhaps  I  diluted 
mine  too  freely.  The  Scotch  pride  them- 
selves on  their  neatness.  Even  their 
whisky  they  take  neat. 

Scotland  is  called  the  land  of  cakes. 
Their  cake,  however,  is  nothing  like  ours. 
It  is  a  mysterious  composition  known  as 


On  the  Game  of  Golf  189 

a  scone.  A  scone  is  a  cross  between  a 
dog-biscuit  and  a  porous  plaster.  It  is 
composed  of  sawdust  and  water  baked 
in  the  ashes,  and  is  said  to  be  very  nutri- 
tious if  you  can  get  it  down.  To  an  early 
diet  of  scones  may  be  attributed  the 
hardiness  of  the  Scotch  race.  Only  the 
strong  survive.  The  weak  choke  to  death 
in  infancy. 

Every  golfer  who  has  not  been  to  Scot- 
land should  go,  even  if  his  family  have  to 
be  denied  some  of  the  necessities  of  life. 
You  will  never  fully  appreciate  the  de- 
lights of  the  game  until  you  play  there, 
amid  lovely  surroundings,  on  perfect  turf, 
with  pluperfect  caddies,  and  surrounded 
by  players  who  play  with  a  calm  and 
temperate  joy,  instead  of  with  the  frenzied 
haste,  extreme  irritability,  and  appalling 
language  too  often  in  evidence  on  our  side 
of  the  pond. 


HOTEL  SUICIDES 


HOTEL  SUICIDES 

I  REMEMBER  hearing  Jim  Breslin, 
at  one  of  our  banquets,  describe 
his  early  trials  and  tribulations  in  the  hotel 
business — how  he  began  at  the  bottom  of 
the  ladder  and  worked  his  way  up.  Now, 
the  difference  between  Jim  Breslin  and 
myself  is,  that  while  he  began  at  the 
bottom  of  the  ladder  and  slowly  worked 
his  way  up,  I  began  at  the  top  of  the 
ladder  and  have  been  rapidly  working 
my  way  downward  ever  since.  But  the 
ladder  I  began  at  the  top  of  was  the  step- 
ladder,  and  the  way  of  it  was  this :  When 
I  first  embarked  in  the  hotel  business  I 
said  to  dear  old  Garrison,  "I  want  to 
learn  this  business  thoroughly"  (I  was 
young  enough  to  have  a  childish  notion 

193 


194  A  Few  Remarks 

that  a  hotel  man  ought  to  be  conversant 
with  the  details  of  business).  Well,  Mr. 
Garrison  looked  me  all  over  and  took  in 
the  full  details  of  my  Gothic  style  of  ar- 
chitecture, and  he  said: 

"Nature  has  not  been  very  lavish  to 
you  in  the  matter  of  fleshly  charms,  but 
she  has  evidently  intended  you  for  some 
purpose,  and  in  my  opinion  that  purpose 
is  to  perfectly  adapt  you  to  going  up  a 
step-ladder,  crawling  over  a  transom, 
and  opening  the  door,  in  cases  of  suicide." 

Well,  naturally  I  was  dazzled  at  the  bril- 
liant prospect  which  I  saw  opening  before 
me,  and  I  flung  myself  into  the  work  with 
all  the  abandon  of  youth;  and  I  think  I 
may  say,  without  being  accused  of  undue 
vanity,  that  when  it  comes  to  crawling 
over  transoms  there  is  no  man  in  the  pro- 
fession who  is  my  peer.  There  are  men 
in  this  room,  famous  all  over  the  country 


Hotel  Suicides  *95 

as  hotel-keepers,  but  none  of  them  could 
ever  hope  to  achieve  distinction  at  crawl- 
ing over  transoms. 

And  speaking  of  suicides  (I  always  wax 
eloquent  when  I  get  on  this  subject,  for  it 
is  one  with  which  I  am  thoroughly  con- 
versant), it  is  strange  that,  with  all  the  new 
and  beautiful  hotels  which  have  of  late 
been  erected,  our  old  place  still  continues 
to  be  the  favoured  resort  for  that  class  of 
trade.  Indeed,  I  sometimes  think  that 
these  beautiful  palaces  rather  boom  the 
industry,  for  when  a  man  has  spent  a  day 
or  two  at  the  Holland,  or  the  Waldorf, 
the  Plaza  or  the  Savoy,  and  has  received 
and  paid  his  bill,  he  has  nothing  left  to 
for ;  and  what  more  natural  than  that 

:  should  come  into  our  place  and  blow 
his  brains  out?  We  have  never  catered 
to  this  class  of  trade.  We  have  never 
written   letters   to  prospective  suicides  at 


1 9  6  A  Few  Remarks 

other  hotels,  inviting  them  to  come  with  us 
at  reduced  rates;  and  yet,  when  a  man 
feels  that  it  is  time  for  him  to  make  a  cut, 
and  shuffle  off  his  mortal  coil,  it  seems 
perfectly  natural  for  him  to  drift  into  our 
hotel,  unostentatious  though  it  be.  It 
is  a  comparatively  easy  class  of  trade  to 
satisfy.  They  do  not  stop  to  inquire 
whether  the  plumbing  is  modern  or 
antique.  They  do  not  ask  whether  then- 
rooms  are  decorated  in  the  style  of  the 
First  Empire  or  the  Seventh  Ward. 
Give  them  a  good  six-foot  gas-burner, 
about  fifteen  hundred  feet  of  illuminating 
gas  at  $1.00  a  thousand,  and  a  few  uninter- 
rupted moments,  and  they  are  content. 

Not  long  since  I  came  into  my  office 
one  morning  and  found  a  gentleman 
there  simply  boiling  with  rage.  It  seems 
that  he  had  just  been  married — indeed, 
had  spent  the  first  night  of  his  marital 


Hotel  Suicides  197 

career  under  our  roof.  On  arising  in  the 
morning  he  had  been  told  by  some  busy- 
body that  the  room  which  he  occupied 
had,  on  the  previous  day,  been  occupied 
by  two  persons  who  had  committed 
suicide  therein. 

He  was  very  indignant.  I  endeavoured 
to  pacify  him.  I  said:  "My  dear  sir,  you 
would  scarcely  expect  us  to  put  a  silver 
plate  on  the  door,  and  silver  handles,  and 
consecrate  the  room  to  the  memory  of  the 
dear  departed.  We  are  conducting  a 
hotel,  not  a  cemetery."  But  he  was  very 
indignant,  and  made  remarks  which  were 
painful  to  one  of  my  shrinking,  sensitive 
organization. 

I  always  have  a  tender  spot  in  my  heart 
toward  newspaper  men.  What  would 
hotels  do  without  them?  Whenever  we 
have  a  fire  or  a  robbery  or  a  suicide,  or 
are    wrongfully   named  as  co-respondent, 


198  A  Few  Remarks 

who  is  the  first  to  fly  to  us  in  the  hour 
of  our  affliction?  The  newspaper  man. 
And  he  proceeds  to  give  us  a  big  send-off. 
I  say  "send-off,"  for  it  generally  has  the 
effect  of  sending  off  a  lot  of  star  boarders. 
I  once  had  a  peculiar  dazzling  suicide  at 
my  place  in  which  two  persons  quenched 
the  vital  spark  and  destroyed  a  new 
Wilton  carpet  simultaneously.  This  acci- 
dent was  splendidly  written  up  in  one  of 
our  leading  journals,  with  lovely  portraits 
of  the  principals  (evolved  from  the  imagi- 
nation of  the  artist).  My  portrait  was 
also  printed,  together  with  a  brief  synopsis 
of  my  life.  I  shall  never  forget  my  wife's 
exclamation  of  delight  when  the  article  was 
shown  her,  and  her  simple,  unaffected  joy 
and  pride  at  seeing  my  picture  side  by 
side  with  the  deceased  was  tiuly  touch- 
ing. It  is  needless  to  say  that  for  a  long 
time   thereafter    our    place    was    simply 


Hotel  Suicides  199 

thronged  with  suicides,  and  all  without 
costing  us  a  cent.  So  I  never  let  an 
opportunity  pass  to  say  a  good  word  for 
newspaper  men. 


NEW  HOTELS 


NEW  HOTELS 

NEW  YORK  has  become  the  greatest 
hotel  centre  in  the  world.  We 
have  more  hotels  than  London,  Paris  and 
Berlin  combined.  In  a  few  years  a  private 
house  will  be  a  novelty.  People  are 
awakening  to  the  fact  that  fifty  families 
can  live  under  one  roof,  with  one  kitchen, 
one  housekeeper,  one  laundry,  and  one 
dining-room,  cheaper  and  better  than  they 
can  live  in  fifty  houses,  each  with  its 
kitchen,  its  laundry,  its  housekeeper,  and 
its  dining-room.  Our  business  has  sprung 
from  one  of  minor  importance  into  one  of 
the  greatest  of  the  industries.  There  are 
twice  as  many  hotels  in  New  York  to-day 
as  there  were  a  year  ago,  and  they  are 
203 


204  A  Few  Remarks 

being  put  up  by  the  dozen,  by  the  score, 
by  the  hundred. 

One  is  being  erected  near  me  which 
they  say  will  be  twenty  stories  high,  but 
you  can't  believe  all  the  stories  you  hear. 
Its  proprietors  kindly  say  that  it  is  to 
accommodate  the  overflow  from  the  Grand 
Union.  I  notify  them  now,  however, 
that  if  any  boarders  overflow  from  the 
Grand  Union  it  will  be  over  my  dead  body. 

A  few  years  ago  fine  modern  hotels  in 
New  York  were  rare.  Nowadays  fine 
hotels  are  rather  overdone. 

Just  look  at  the  new  hotels  that  have 
gone  up  !  And  just  look  at  the  old  ones 
that  have  "gone  up"!  Isn't  it  awful — 
especially  if  you  don't  happen  to  have 
one  of  the  new  ones  ? 

Enter  one  of  these  modern  palaces. 
Go  into  the  restaurant  (if  you've  got  the 
price).     Note  the  lavish  decoration;  the 


New   Hotels  205 

beautiful  furniture  covered  with  rich 
tapestries  and  costly  chattel  mort- 
gages; the  heavy  carpets  into  which  the 
foot  as  well  as  more  or  less  soup  and  gravy 
sinks  noiselessly ;  the  softly  shaded  lights ; 
the  Hungarian  band  setting  your  teeth 
on  edge  so  you  can  chew  the  steak  with 
comparative  ease;  waiters  moving  noise- 
lessly about,  skilfully  inserting  their 
thumbs  into  the  soup  and  deftly  dropping 
lobster  salad  down  the  back  of  your  neck ; 
at  the  tables  are  seated  lovely  women, 
chatting  gaily  and  sizing  up  each  other's 
costumes,  while  their  escorts,  in  cute  little 
swallow-tail  coats,  vie  with  one  another 
to  see  who  can  spend  the  most  time  and 
the  least  money.  It  is  a  scene  of  delirious 
joy  and  beauty,  and  as  the  old  hotel- 
keeper  returns  to  his  plain  back-number 
hotel,  and  takes  up  again  his  interrupted 
labours,  a  shuddering  sigh  wells  up  from 


A  Few  Remarks 

his  midst  and  a  scalding  tear  falls  upon 
the  pile  of  bonds  from  which  he  is  wearily 
cutting    the    coupons. 

And  now  we  are  to  have  a  woman's 
hotel !  That  will  fill  a  long-felt  want. 
We  all  have  a  few  lady  boarders  we  would 
like  to  recommend — ladies  with  strong 
minds  and  weak  appetites,  the  kind  that 
send  for  a  waiter  and  order  a  pot  of  tea,  a 
package  of  canary-bird  seed  and  a  hot  flat- 
iron  and  "don't  be  all  day  about  it,  please." 
What  a  pleasure  it  would  be  for  a  man  who 
was  ready  and  anxious  to  die  to  run  such 
an  Adamless  Eden  !  With  what  harmony 
will  the  inmates  mingle  together !  Just 
imagine  the  conversation  which  will  ensue 
after  the  first  lady  with  peroxide  hair 
comes  down  to  breakfast  in  a  pink  Mother 
Hubbard  ! 

But,  seriously,  what  is  to  become  of  the 
older  hotels  if  they  don't  stop  putting  up 


New  Hotels 

new  ones?  It  is  a  question  I  hate  to 
dwell  on,  but  I  must  dwell  on  something  ! 

One  comforting  thing  for  us  old-timers 
is  that  in  these  new  hotels  the  prices 
rather  dwarf  the  buildings.  It  is  said 
that  their  bills  are  so  high  no  boarders  can 
ever  jump  them;  and  they  do  not  fear 
suicides,  for  when  the  guest  is  told  the 
price  of  his  rooms  it  takes  his  breath  away 
so  he  can't  blow  out  the  gas. 

If  the  Tower  of  Babel  were  to  make  its 
appearance  in  New  York  to-day,  one  could 
imagine  the  Waldorf  and  the  Netherland 
and  other  giants  saying  to  each  other, 
"Who  is  this  little  sa wed-off  that  has 
come  to  town?" 

There  are  nice  things  about  tall  hotels. 
The  guests  get  fine  air.  When  a  person 
of  moderate  means  stops  at  one  of  them 
and  pays  for  his  room,  he  hasn't  much 
money  left,  and  naturally  he  looks  for  good, 


208  A  Few  Remarks 

wholesome,  nutritious  air.  He  is  entitled 
to  the  best. 

Then,  the  rooms  are  small  and  cozy — 
there  isn't  even  room  for  suspicion  in  them, 
and  that  is  a  burden  lifted  from  the 
hotel  man's  mind.  One  lady  complained 
to  the  manager  of  the  loftiest  of  these 
palaces  that  there  was  no  place  for  a  trunk 
in  her  room. 

"That's  all  right,  madam,"  said  he, 
"  after  you've  paid  your  bill  you'll  have  no 
further  use  for  a  trunk." 

The  advantages,  however,  are  not  all  for 
the  boarders.  I  was  told  of  one  hotel- 
keeper  who,  during  a  business  depression, 
ensconced  himself  in  a  room  on  the  seven- 
teenth floor,  and  when  creditors  beset  him 
said  to  his  employees : 

"  Hang  out  our  banners  on  the  outer  walls; 
The  cry  is  still  they  come." 

Callers  who  looked  like  collectors  would 


New   Hotels  209 

be  told  that  the  elevators  were  not  running 
and  invited  to  walk  up.  When  they  got 
up,  with  decreased  breath  and  enlarged 
heart,  a  polite  clerk  would  inform  them 
that  the  proprietor  had  just  stepped  down 
and  invited  them  to  call  again.  After  that 
they  would  retire  and  charge  up  the  account 
to  profit  and  loss.  One  fellow — I  think  it 
was  Bob  Brown — walked  up  and  up  and 
up,  and  when  he  finally  reached  the  office 
he  knocked  on  the  door,  entered  and  said, 
"Is  God  in?" 

The  idea  of  building  the  Astoria  was 
undoubtedly  suggested  to  Mr.  Astor  by 
that  now  historic  tramp  who  slept  in  his 
spare  room.  It  must  have  awakened  in 
John  Jacob's  breast  a  wild  yearning  to 
keep  boarders.  I  suppose  he  said  to  him- 
self: "The  glory  of  my  family  was  begun 
by  the  buying  and  selling  of  skins  on  the 
borders.     I    will    perpetuate    the    family 


210  A  Few  Remarks 

glory  and  see  what  I  can  do  in  the  way  of 
skins  on  the  boarders  myself.  I  will  put 
up  a  house  so  big  and  fine  that  Cousin  Bill 
will  think  he's  running  a  fifteen-cent 
lodging-house  next  door."  And  lo  !  Jacob 
fell  asleep,  "and  he  dreamed  and  beheld  a 
ladder  set  up  on  the  earth,  and  the  top  of  it 
reached  to  heaven,  and  behold  the  four 
hundred  ascended  and  descended  upon  it." 

(I  believe  I  missed  my  vocation  when 
my  parents  refused  to  let  me  enter  the 
theological  seminary.) 

Meanwhile,  we  old-timers  try  to  make 
things  as  agreeable  as  possible  for  our 
respective  receivers,  realizing  that  progress 
is  the  order  of  the  day  and  that  the  old 
must  give  way  to  the  new,  and  living  on 
the  memories  of  the  glorious  past  when 
there  were  boarders  enough  to  go  around. 


SOME  MORE  ABOUT  AUTOMOBILES 


SOME   MORE  ABOUT  AUTOMOBILES 

T  FEEL  somewhat  embarrassed  at  being 
here  again  this  year,  and  feel  it  due  to 
myself  to  state  that  I  did  not  come  without 
a  violent  struggle.  The  seventy-horse- 
power gasoline  chairman  of  your  com- 
mittee on  chin-music  came  and  camped 
in  my  office,  and  as  he  is  not  provided  with 
a  muffler,  I  finally  made  up  my  mind  it 
was  better  to  sacrifice  my  convictions 
rather  than  my  ear-drums,  and  so,  "  saying 
I  would  ne'er  consent,  consented." 

Not  but  what  I  am  flattered  at  being 
asked  to  address  so  distinguished  a  gather- 
ing of  millionaires — (I  do  not  use  the  term 
in  an  offensive  sense,  but  I  know  from  ex- 
perience that  only  us  millionaires  can  be 
automobilists) — but  I  told  you  last  year 
everything  I  knew  about  automobiling 
213 


214  A  Few  Remarks 

and  a  good  deal  I  didn't  know,  and  this 
year  I  have  nothing  left  to  say,  and  I  will 
now  proceed  to  say  it. 

Some  people  think  it's  a  cinch  to  be  up 
here  among  the  wax-works,  trying  to  look 
the  part,  and  getting  free  food  and  drink, 
so-called.  The  head  table  is  usually 
adorned  by  men  who  are  asked  to  speak 
and  don't  want  to,  and  men  who  want  to 
speak  and  aren't  asked  to,  so  that  all  hands 
are  miserable.  We  are  all  entitled  to 
sympathy,  but  only  get  envy. 

Those  of  you  who  were  sufficiently  in 
possession  of  your  faculties  at  the  time 
may  remember  that  last  year  I  described 
a  ten-jackass-power  lobster-coloured  crea- 
tion which,  in  a  moment  of  temporary 
aberration  of  mind,  I  paid  out  my  good 
money  for.  It  was  described  in  the  ad- 
vertisement as  a  smooth,  swift,  silent,  and 
powerful  vehicle,  so  simple  in  its  mechan- 


Some  More  About  Automobiles    215 

ism  that  a  babe  in  arms  could  easily  ma- 
nipulate it.  The  only  thing  smooth  about 
it  was  the  fellow  that  wrote  the  adver- 
tisement, and  the  only  thing  easy  about 
it  was  the  gifted  orator  who  is  now  address- 
ing you. 

You  will  be  pleased  to  learn  that  I  have 
that  machine  still,  although  it's  no  fault  of 
mine.  The  only  original  part  of  it  remain- 
ing is  the  horn.  I  haven't  had  to  use  that 
much.  I  don't  believe  in  blowing  my 
own  horn.  I  only  use  it  when  there  is 
imminent  danger  of  somebody  running 
into  me  from  astern,  and  to  keep  cows 
from  jumping  into  the  tonneau  and  biting 
me. 

Well,  as  I  remarked,  with  all  its  faults 
I  have  it  still.  I  have  tried  in  vain  to 
dispose  of  it  at  private  sale,  by  public 
auction,  by  trade,  gift,  raffle,  grab-bag,  and 
fish-pond.     I  have  left  it  by  the  roadside, 


216  A  Few  Remarks 

unattended,  for  long  periods,  hoping  some 
poor  fool  would  come  and  steal  it.  I  have 
freely  tendered  it  to  friends,  enemies, 
relatives,  old  ladies'  homes,  poor-houses, 
gold  cures,  and  lunatic  asylums,  and  it  has 
always  been  refused  with  scorn  and  vituper- 
ation. It  cleaveth  unto  me  like  a  porous 
plaster,  and,  like  the  Old  Man  of  the  Sea, 
it  is  impossible  to  shake,  and  so  I  am  still 
compelled  to  figure  it  among  my  liabilities, 
and  have  come  to  regard  it  in  the  light  of  a 
penance  for  my  sins. 

And  yet  there  have  been  moments — ■ 
rare  moments — when  I  have  experienced 
the  keenest  delight  from  its  use.  Some- 
times, when  it  has  been  returned  to  me, 
fresh  from  the  factory,  having  been  en- 
tirely reconstructed,  and  I  have  succeeded 
in  getting  my  wife  to  join  me  in  putting 
another  mortgage  on  our  humble  home,  it 
has  run  smoothly  and  swiftly  for  several 


Some  More  About  Automobiles     217 

moments  before  disintegrating.  At  such 
times  I  have  experienced  an  exhilaration 
such  as  the  bird  must  feel,  when  with 
motionless  wing  it  drops  with  lightning 
speed  earthward  from  the  far  heights  of 
the  blue  empyrean.  And  then  a  town 
constable  steps  out  from  behind  a  telegraph 
pole  and  hales  me  to  the  nearest  magistrate, 
and  I  have  to  give  up  twenty. 

The  constable  swears  that  I  was  running 
at  least  seventy  miles  an  hour  and  had 
been  constantly  doing  so  for  weeks,  de- 
spite frequent  warnings ;  that  when  arrested 
I  was  completely  surrounded  by  school- 
houses,  places  of  worship,  post-offices,  and 
coloured  orphan  asylums;  and  that  the 
entire  landscape  was  smeared  with  signs 
forbidding  automobilists  to  proceed  at  a 
rate  of  over  one  mile  an  hour.  Before  he 
gets  through  I  begin  to  think  I  am  Barney 
Oldfield  on  Bullet  No.  2. 


2i8  A  Few  Remarks 

I  then  swear  on  a  stack  of  Bibles  that 
my  machine  is  incapable  of  attaining  a 
speed  of  over  eight  miles  an  hour,  that  I 
was  running  at  the  time  on  the  hill-climb- 
ing gear,  with  both  brakes  on,  that  my  gas 
was  cut  off,  and  was  mighty  poor  gas  at 
that,  that  my  spark  was  working  on  half 
time,  that  my  oil  was  all  gummed  up,  and 
that  I  was  riding  behind  a  funeral  pro- 
cession, and  was  having  difficulty  in  keep- 
ing up.  My  chauffeur  and  guests  also 
perjure  themselves.  But  nobody  ever 
believes  an  automobilist — I  don't  myself 
— and  so  the  magistrate,  licking  his  chops, 
soaks  it  to  me,  for  the  country  magistrate, 
like  death,  "loves  a  shining  mark." 

I  was  pleased  to  note  at  the  show  that 
we  are  beginning  to  build  better  motors. 
It  is  a  shame  that  we,  a  nation  of  mechan- 
ics, should  allow  ourselves  to  be  outbuilt 
by  the  French  and  Germans. 


Some  More  About  Automobiles    219 

We  have  been  building  too  cheaply. 
Unless  a  motor  is  very  good,  it  is  no  good. 
Our  makers  have  been  turning  out  lovely 
cars,  glittering  with  paint,  varnish,  and 
brass,  and  fitted  up  as  luxuriously  as 
Cleopatra's  barge.  And  then  if  they  had 
any  money  left  they  would  conceal  a  cute 
little  engine  somewhere  about — a  kind  of 
cross  between  a  cuckoo-clock  and  an  ice- 
cream freezer,  with  the  vices  of  each  and 
the  virtues  of  neither.  What  is  the  use 
of  a  body  fitted  out  in  the  style  of  Louis 
Quinze  when  the  cylinders  are  made  in 
the  style  of  tomato-cans?  As  soon  as 
these  feeble  aenemic  motors  get  warmed 
up,  the  lead  bushings  dissolve  in  tears  and 
the  lead-gears  gnash  their  teeth  and  dis- 
integrate, and  with  a  gasp  and  a  gurgle  the 
poor  little  engine  goes  out  of  business. 
And  all  because  we  are  trying  de- 
partment-store  bargain -counter    marked- 


220  A  Few  Remarks 

down  -  from  -  meet  -  me  -  at  -  the  -  fountain 
methods. 

I  tell  you  the  best  is  none  too  good, 
and  if  a  man  can't  afford  a  good  one  he 
can  afford  to  wait  until  he  can  afford  a 
good  one. 


NEW  YORK   FOR   CONVENTIONS 


NEW  YORK   FOR   CONVENTIONS 

FORTUNATELY,  for  me,  landlords 
are  not  expected  to  be  intellectual. 
Brains  are  not  required  in  our  business. 
All  we  have  to  do  is  to  open  our  hotels  and 
the  boarders  will  tell  us  how  to  run  'em. 
We  landlords  hope  to  have  this  National 
Democratic  Convention  held  in  New  York. 
First,  because  we  believe  it  is  the  best 
place  for  it.  Second,  for  the  honour  of 
our  metropolis,  of  which  we  are  loyal 
citizens.  Third,  because  it  is  to  be  held 
at  a  time  of  year  when  our  great  hotels 
are  well-nigh  empty,  and  it  would  give 
us  a  chance  to  make  an  honest  dollar — 
with  the  accent  on  the  honest — and  like- 
wise give  us  an  opportunity  to  entertain 
and  care  for  the  delegates  and  visitors  in 
223 


224  A  Few  Remarks 

a  way  novel  in  the  history  of  national 
conventions. 

I  will  not  attempt  to  recite  the  glories 
of  New  York.  That  has  already  been 
done  by  tongue  of  silver  and  by  lung  of 
brass;  and  besides,  you  have  "all  been 
there  before,  many  a  time,"  and  probably 
know  more  about  the  city  than  we  do. 

You  have  already  heard  and  have  still 
to  hear  the  most  dazzling  accounts  of  the 
beauties  and  glories  of  other  cities.  But 
of  what  avail  are  all  of  these  beauties  and 
glories  to  the  weary  delegate  if  he  must 
spend  his  nights  fitfully  slumbering  upon 
a  billiard  table  or  uneasily  tossing  within 
the  narrow  confines  of  a  hotel  bathtub  ? 

I  admit  that  there  may  be  some 
delegates  who  would  not  be  seriously 
injured  by  spending  a  night  or  two 
in  a  bathtub.  I  understand  that  the 
Honourable  Chauncey  M.  Depew  slept  in 


New    York    for    Conventions       225 

one  at  Minneapolis,  and  I  presume  it 
was  of  benefit  to  him,  but  the  ordinary- 
delegate  naturally  prefers  to  "wrap  the 
drapery  of  his  couch  about  him  and  lie 
down  to  pleasant  dreams,"  and  you 
can't  blame  him. 

To  such  I  would  say  New  York  is  the 
only  city  in  the  land  that  can  give  every 
visitor  to  a  national  convention  a  com- 
fortable bed  at  night.  Our  motto  is 
"  Excelsior,  "  but  we  don't  force  our  motto 
into  our  hair  mattresses. 

"Sleep  sweetly  in  this  quiet  room, 
O  thou,  whoe'er  thou  art, 
And  let  no  mournful  yesterday 
Disturb  thy  peaceful  heart." 

This  sentiment  doubtless  sounds  strained 
to  delegates  who  have  been  accustomed 
to  sleeping  four  in  a  bed  and  two  in  the 
bureau  at  conventions,  but  New  York  is 
a  big  town  and  has  big  hotels  and  lots 
of  'em. 


226  A  Few  Remarks 

New  York  has  more  hotel  accommoda- 
tions than  the  cities  of  Chicago,  Cincinnati 
and  St.  Louis  combined.  Lest  I  be 
accused  of  boasting,  I  will  not  dwell  upon 
their  merits,  but  content  myself  with  the 
modest  assertion  that  they  are  the  best 
and  the  finest  in  the  world.  We  have 
fine  hotels  for  fine  people,  good  hotels  for 
good  people,  plain  hotels  for  plain  people, 
and  some  bum  hotels  for  bums;  but  we 
don't  expect  the  latter  to  be  patronized 
during  the  convention. 

Chicago  has  a  sign  outside  of  her  head- 
quarters which  reads,  "Most  of  the  dele- 
gates passed  through  Chicago  on  their 
way  here."  Can  you  blame  'em?  We 
have  to  pass  through  lots  of  unpleasant 
things  in  this  life — teething,  mumps, 
measles — but  why  harp  upon  it? 

It  may  be  true  that  most  of  the  delegates 
have    gone    through    Chicago,    but    it    is 


New    York   for    Conventions       227 

equally  true  that  Chicago,  a  number  of 
times,  has  gone  through  most  of  the 
delegates. 

We  have  heard  some  very  glowing 
description  of  western  cities,  here  and  in 
the  lobbies,  and  especially  the  most 
entrancing  tales  of  the  beauties  of  the 
Union  Depot  of  St.  Louis. 

I  spent  two  days  in  St.  Louis  once, 
during  one  of  those  crisp,  frosty  spells 
which  they  describe  as  being  so  prev- 
alent there  in  the  month  of  July, 
and  when  I  got  to  the  Union  Depot, 
bound  for  New  York,  I  admit  that  it  was 
the  most  beautiful  and  welcome  sight 
that  ever  gladdened  my  eyes.  Now,  we 
have  a  number  of  depots  in  New  York 
(most  of  which  are  located  in  Hoboken, 
.'  Jersey),  but  were  they  as  fair  as 
M  n's  palace  you  would  not  enjoy 
seeing    them,    for   your   heart   would   be 


228  A  Few  Remarks 

heavy  at  the  thought  of  leaving  our 
beautiful  city  by  the  sea. 

The  editor  of  the  Washington  Post  gets 
a  little  hysterical  about  New  York  in  an 
editorial  this  morning.  He  says  "navi- 
gating the  streets  of  New  York  is  as  diffi- 
cult as  ascending  the  Matterhorn. "  I  am 
afraid  the  editor  got  lured  into  that 
broad  thoroughfare  of  ours  ' '  where  they  do 
such  things  and  they  say  such  things,"  and 
found  it  too  narrow  for  him. 

Come  down  to  salt  water,  gentlemen, 
and  hold  the  next  Democratic  National 
Convention.  We  are  accustomed  to 
handling  large  gatherings,  and  we  have 
yet  to  hear  a  complaint  of  extortion  against 
a  New  York  landlord.  You  will  find  us 
hail  fellows,  men  of  fair  dealing,  to  be 
relied  upon.  We  make  you  this  pledge, 
and  we  will  live  up  to  it  to  the  letter. 

And  when  you  are  ready  to  return  to 


New    York    for    Conventions       229 

your  homes  (which  you  will  do  with  regret) 
you  will  sigh  with  the  poet  Shenstone: 

"Whoe'er  has  traveled  life's  dull  round, 
Where'er  his  stages  may  have  been, 
May  sigh  to  think  he  still  has  found 
The  warmest  welcome  at  an  inn." 


IMPRESSIONS  OF  BOSTON 


IMPRESSIONS  OF  BOSTON 

EVERY  time  I  get  an  invitation  to 
Boston,  my  wife  says  to  me, 
"Why  do  you  take  that  long,  tiresome 
trip  when  you  can  stay  right  here  at  home 
and  lay  in  your  winter  stock  of  dyspepsia 
without  its  costing  you  a  cent  ? "  To  which 
I  reply,  "My  dear,  I  consider  it  an  honour 
to  be  asked  and  a  pleasure  to  attend,  and 
I  return  with  the  proud  consciousness 
that  I  have  given  the  residents  of  Boston 
an  intellectual  treat." 

I  never  refuse  an  invitation  to  come 
and  enjoy  your  hospitality,  and  sit  up  here 
at  the  head  table  with  your  Mayors  and 
Governors,  and  Attorney-Generals,  and 
Postmasters.  I  like  to  mingle  on  equal 
terms  with  men  of  this  class,  just  to  show 

233 


234  A  Few  Remarks 

them  I'm  not  stuck  up.  I  find  them  good 
fellows,  and  when  they  have  assimilated 
sufficient  alcohol  to  thaw  them  out  they 
become  real  genial — especially  the  Gov- 
ernors. But  afterward,  when  one  has 
occasion  to  look  them  up  to  get  a  pardon 
for  some  relative  who  is  doing  time,  one 
generally  finds  that  a  severe  frost  has 
supervened. 

I  love  to  ride  over  that  magnificent 
highway  of  travel  which  connects  Boston 
and  New  York,  and  pay  seven  dollars  for 
the  privilege  of  sitting  in  a  stuffy  palace 
car  of  the  vintage  of  1843,  and  eat  for 
lunch  Chicken  a  la  Marengo  canned  in  the 
same  year.  This  road  has  two  virtues, 
however.  One  virtue  is,  that  its  Boston 
terminus  is  immediately  opposite  the  bar- 
room of  the  Thorndikc.  The  other  virtue 
is,  that  its  New  York  terminus  is  immedi- 
ately    opposite    the   barroom   of  a  hotel 


Impressions  of  Boston 

the  name  of  which  has  escaped  me  for  the 
moment.  I  believe  much  of  the  success 
of  these  two  hotels  is  due  to  the  fact  that 
riding  on  this  railroad  has  a  tendency  to 
drive  men  to  drink. 

And  then,  I  truly  love  Boston  !  There 
is  an  air  of  chaste  refinement  and  culture 
about  it  which  appeals  to  my  thoughtful 
and  poetic  nature;  and  as  I  walk  your 
tortuous  streets  and  get  jostled  off  the  side- 
walks by  your  impetuous  excess  female 
population,  and  ever  and  anon  get  run 
over  by  one  of  your  trolley-cars,  I  feel  that 
I  am  treading  the  paths  trod  by  Webster, 
by  Emerson,  by  Lowell,  by  Holmes  and  by 
Longfellow,  and  my  heart  gives  a  great 
leap  when  I  think  what  me  and  these 
men  have  done  to  add  to  the  knowledge 
and  culture  of  Boston,  and  of  the  world. 
Sometimes  I  am  so  overcome  by  this 
thought    that    I    feel    obliged    to   go   into 


236  A  Few  Remarks 

the  Touraine  and  stifle  my  emotion  by 
quaffing  a  foaming  beaker  of  sarsa- 
parilla. 

I  love  to  visit  your  cute  little  city,  so 
replete  with  trolley-cars  and  historic 
interest,  and  to  take  an  hour  to  stroll 
through  your  business  centre  and  look 
in  the  shop  windows  to  see  if  anything 
displayed  therein  has  been  disturbed 
since  I  was  here  last.  I  love  to  visit 
Faneuil  Hall,  the  Cradle  of  Liberty,  where 
our  forefathers  carved  out  this  great 
Republic,  and  then  go  down  in  the  base- 
ment and  see  the  good  fellows  who  carve 
out  steaks  and  chops  for  the  hotels.  I 
understand  that  you  Bostonians  pronounce 
this  "Funnel"  Hall,  and  alter  I  paid  my 
visit  to  the  butchers  and  took  all  the 
drinks  they  poured  into  me,  I  could 
understand  why  you  called  it  Funnel  Hall. 
I    also    enjoyed    visiting    the  Old    South 


Impressions  of  Boston  237 

Church  and  Young's  Hotel,  and  other 
Revolutionary  relics. 

It's  marvelous  to  what  perfection  the 
modern  city  hotel  has  come.  Your 
Touraine  is  beautiful !  Every  detail 
carried  out  so  perfectly — even  to  an 
electric  apparatus  for  heating  curling- 
irons.  When  I  stopped  there  and  found 
I  could  heat  my  curling-irons  without 
standing  on  a  chair  and  holding  them  in 
the  gas,  I  felt  that  life  had  nothing  more 
to  offer.  But  after  all,  I  do  not  believe 
they  are  needed,  for  when  the  guest  learns 
the  price  of  his  room  it  will  make  his  hair 
curl  without  artificial  aid. 

The  last  time  I  was  here  I  was  greatly 
impressed  by  the  gorgeous  coats-of-arms  or 
crests  which  you  hotel  men  all  sport  on  your 
stationery.  Somehow  broiled  scrod  or 
liver  and  bacon  taste  more  aristocratic 
and  recherche  when  there  is  a  fine  crest 


23^  A  Few  Remarks 

glittering  on  the  bill  of  fare.  I  went  home 
determined  to  invest  in  a  coat-of-arms, 
and  consulted  a  College  of  Heraldry  at 
once.  The  boss  asked  me  if  we  had  a 
coat-of-arms  in  my  family.  I  was  forced 
to  confess  that  we  had  struggled  along  as 
best  we  might  without  one.  He  asked 
me  if  I  or  my  family  had  ever  done  any- 
thing in  particular.  I  assured  him  we 
had  never  been  detected  doing  anything 
for  which  we  could  not  prove  an  alibi. 
Finally,  however,  he  produced  a  crest, 
consisting  of  a  shield  with  various  quarter- 
ings  surmounted  by  a  bird,  which  looked 
like  a  scalded  Philadelphia  broiler  rampant 
sitting  on  a  buckwheat  cake  couchant, 
holding  in  its  talons  a  red  frankfurter 
sausage  on  which  was  inscribed  the  Latin 
sentence,  Nux  Vomica,  Spiritits  Frumenti, 
Sic  Semper  Tyrannis,  which,  being  trans- 
lated, reads,  ' '  Guests  having  hand-baggage 
only  will  be  required  to  pay  in  advance. " 


HOTELS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND 


HOTELS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND 

I  HAVE  personally  a  very  kindly 
feeling  toward  the  New  England 
hotel  men  and  the  New  England  hotels, 
for  I  was  raised  in  a  little  New  England 
hotel  in  a  little  New  England  town. 
My  parents  paid  four  dollars  a  week  for 
my  board,  and  it  is  my  pride  and  boast 
that  the  landlady  never  made  a  cent 
out  of  me. 

A  year  ago  I  took  my  son  on  a  tandem 
bicycle  and  rode  through  some  of  the 
interesting  old  towns  along  the  eastern 
shore.  If  there  is  anything  in  this  world 
calculated  to  give  one  a  copious  thirst,  it 
is  pushing  along  on  a  tandem  a  large  over- 
grown boy  with  a  natural  shrinking  from 
overexertion.  We  visited  a  lot  of  fasci- 
241 


242  A  Few  Remarks 

nating  Colonial  towns  replete  with  historic 
interest,  but  singularly  deficient  in  lager 
beer  saloons.  I  found  that  my  thirst  for 
knowledge  was  entirely  outclassed  by  my 
thirst  for  malt  beverages.  I  bore  that 
thirst  with  me  for  many  a  weary  mile,  and 
I  shall  never  forget  Newbury  port,  for 
that  was  the  first  wet  town  I  struck,  and 
there  I  slaked  my  thirst.  I  am  a  temper- 
ate man,  like  most  hotel  men,  but  a  few 
visits  to  total  abstinence  towns,  I  am 
satisfied,  would  drive  me  to  a  drunkard's 
grave. 

I  remember  Newburyport  with  peculiar 
pleasure,  not  alone  on  account  of  the 
slaking  of  my  thirst,  nor  because  of  the 
courtesy  received  at  the  Wolfe  Tavern, 
but  because  I  saw  there  what  I  never  saw 
before.  When  dinner  time  came,  the 
little  son  of  one  of  the  proprietors  put  on 
a   little   white    apron    and   went    in   and 


Hotels  in  New  England 

helped  wait  on  the  table.  When  that 
boy  grows  up  he'll  know  something  about 
his  father's  business.  It's  a  rare  thing  in 
this  country  to  find  a  boy  who  isn't  too 
high-toned  to  learn  his  father's  business. 
I  was  also  fortunate  enough  to  pick  up 
some  rare  and  costly  Revolutionary 
china,  which  I  expressed  home  and  subse- 
quently found  was  being  manufactured 
right  along  at  Trenton,  New  Jersey,  and 
was  worth  some  two  dollars  a  cord. 

Also  I  have  been  in  Concord,  N.  H. 
This  town  is  celebrated  because  of  its 
having  among  its  leading  residents  Oliver 
Pelren,  and  Mrs.  Eddy,  the  Mother  of 
Christian  Science.  Oliver  makes  a  hand- 
some living  by  taking  in  the  public — I 
don't  use  the  term  in  an  offensive  sense — 
Mrs.  Eddy  makes  a  handsome  living  also 
by  taking  in  the  public.  Mrs.  Eddy  claims 
that  by  the  practice  of  her  science  or  re- 


244  A  Few  Remarks 

ligion  she  can  heal  anything,  and  Oliver 
says  that  suits  him  exactly ;  of  course,  he 
doesn't  care  to  have  anything  to  do  with 
people  unless  they  are  well  heeled.  Now 
the  Christian  Scientist  believes,  as  I  under- 
stand it — and  if  I  am  wrong  you  will  cor- 
rect me — that  there  is  no  such  thing  as 
matter,  but  only  mind — that  whatever 
you  imagine  to  exist  does  exist,  so  that  if 
the  Scientists  go  down  to  Oliver's  and 
imagine  they  get  a  good  dinner  they 
really  get  it.  I  have  eaten  at  his 
place,  but  I  am  not  a  Christian  Scientist. 
And  when  the  guests  go  out,  if  they 
imagine  they  have  paid  for  their  dinner, 
why,  they  don't  actually,  but  it  seems 
as  if  they  really  had  paid  for  it. 

I  insisted  upon  having  my  boy  educated 
in  New  England  because  I  received  my 
education  in  New  England,  in  spite  of  my 
violent    protests.     I  received   my   educa- 


Hotels  in  New  England  245 

tion,  so-called,  at  a  village  school  in  the 
State  of  Connecticut.  Now,  when  a 
teacher  single-handed  has  to  cope  with 
about  seventy-five  pupils  ranging  from 
three  to  thirty  years  of  age,  especially 
if  he  doesn't  happen  to  be  an  especially 
good  coper,  he  naturally  has  to  spread  out 
his  knowledge  pretty  thin ;  and  I,  being  of 
an  unselfish  nature,  never  endeavoured 
to  absorb  more  than  was  my  just  due. 

But  there  was  one  branch  of  learning 
which  I  thoroughly  absorbed  in  this  temple 
of  learning,  and  that  was  the  art  of  sawing 
wood ;  and  thus,  although  I  was  never  able 
to  square  the  circle,  I  was  able  to  square 
the  teacher.  Up  there  in  Connecticut  the 
winters  were  very  long  and  cold,  and  the 
stoves  were  very  large,  and  the  supply  of 
chilblains  among  the  pupils  far  exceeded 
the  supply  of  wood,  and  the  consequence 
was  that  the  teacher  permitted  me  to  give 


246  A  Few  Remarks 

rein  to  my  natural  bent  and  permitted  me 
to  be  bent  over  a  saw-buck  most  of  the 
time.  It  was  only  the  favoured  pupils  who 
were  permitted,  in  this  institute,  to  saw 
wood ;  the  less  favoured  ones  had  to  ring  the 
bell  and  draw  water  and  take  care  of  the 
stove,  while  the  rest  were  forced  to  content 
themselves  with  the  degrading  occupation 
of  improving  their  minds.  But  it  has  always 
been  a  source  of  great  satisfaction  to  me 
to  think  that  I  was  educated  in  New  Eng- 
land; because,  although  my  knowledge 
may  not  be  large  or  varied,  I  have  always 
felt  that  I  was  thoroughly  versed  in  the 
art  of  sawing  wood ;  and  I  tell  you,  gentle- 
men, to  succeed  in  the  hotel  business  a 
man  has  got  to  saw  wood  all  the  time. 


LORD  BERESFORD  AND 
THE  PILGRIMS 


LORD  BERESFORD  AND 
THE    PILGRIMS 

I  AM  proud  and  happy  in  my  humble 
way  to  chuck  a  few  bouquets  at  Lord 
Charles  Beresford,  and  to  breathe  a  few 
eloquent  and  burning  remarks  in  his  behalf. 
Also,  I'm  willing  to  do  some  eulogizing  for 
the  Pilgrims. 

In  order  to  be  posted  about  this  Pilgrim 
business  I  looked  in  one  of  my  children's 
dictionaries  to  see  the  definition  of  Pilgrim. 
It  said  therein,  "A  pilgrim  is  one  who 
makes  a  pilgrimage."  Then  I  looked  up 
pilgrimage  and  it  said,  "A  pilgrimage  is  a 
journey  undertaken  by  a  pilgrim." 

This  information  did  not  seem  suffi- 
ciently explicit,  so  I  looked  in  the  "  Century 
Dictionary"  and  there  I  found  that  "A 
pilgrim  is  one  who  journeys  to  some  place 


250  A  Few  Remarks 

esteemed  sacred,  either  as  a  penance,  or  in 
order  to  discharge  some  vow  or  religious 
obligation."  I  can  understand  that  for  a 
New  Yorker  to  go  to  London,  or  a  Londoner 
to  come  to  New  York,  may  be  in  the  nature 
of  a  penance,  but  where  the  vow  of  religious 
obligation  comes  in  I  have  not  yet  dis- 
covered, although  I  have  been  to  London 
several  times,  and  never  ventured  out, 
after  dark,  without  a  chaperon. 

Then  I  examined  your  coat-of-arms  or 
crest,  as  it  appeared  on  my  invitation, 
and  that  gave  me  some  light.  I  saw 
thereon  depicted  a  likeness  of  Chauncey 
Depew  wearing  a  marked-down  Rogers- 
Peet  mackintosh,  mounted  on  either  a 
charger  or  a  palfrey,  I  couldn't  tell  which ; 
but  the  Senator  being  a  railroad  man,  and 
therefore  slow  pay,  it  was  probably  a 
charger. 

On  the  southerly  exposure  of  the  charger 


Lord  Bcresford  and  the  Pilgrims    251 

sits  a  bird  which  looks  like  a  cross  between 
the  American  eagle  and  a  Vermont  dry- 
picked  turkey,  and  by  his  side  stalks  the 
British  lion,  with  a  slight  twist  in  his  tail, 
looking  as  if  the  eagle  had  been  trying  to 
take  a  fall  out  of  him. 

Underneath  is  the  Latin  inscription  Hie 
et  ubique,  which,  being  translated,  means 
"Children  over  five  years  of  age  must  pay 
full  fare." 

I  think  the  crest  is  unique  and  appro- 
priate, all  but  the  twist  in  the  lion's  tail.  If 
the  eagle  ever  had  any  inclination  to  twist 
that  tail,  he  has  it  no  longer.  I  hope  it  will 
be  one  of  the  missions  of  the  American 
Pilgrims  to  untwist  that  tail  and  put  it  in 
splints,  and  anoint  it  with  precious  oint- 
ments, and  cause  the  twist  to  vanish  like 
"a  tale  that  is  told,"  for  if  that  lion  and 
eagle  could  be  trained  to  trot  in  double 
harness  they  would  make  a  team  which 


252  A  Few  Remarks 

could  leave  every  other  combination  at 
the  post. 

I  hope  you  will  overlook  this  unexpected 
burst  of  eloquence,  but  I  am  constrained  to 
say  that  I  trust  and  pray  that  this  bird  and 
beast  have  had  their  last  scrap  with  each 
other.  The  eagle  is  prematurely  bald- 
headed,  and  the  lion  has  side  whiskers, 
which  would  indicate  that  he  has  arrived 
at  the  age  of  discretion,  and  as  they  spring 
from  a  common  ancestry  and  speak  a  com- 
mon language,  and  have  a  common  sense  of 
justice  and  fairness  and  decency,  may  they 
stand  side  by  side  as  world-builders  and 
world-civilizers  ' '  with  malice  toward  none, 
with  charity  for  all,  with  firmness  in  the 
right." 

Next  I  looked  up  Lord  Charles.  Of 
course  I  knew  him  by  reputation  as  a  bully 
fellow  and  all-round  sport,  and  I  knew  he 
turned  up  periodically  to  watch  the  British 


Lord  Beresford  and  the  Pilgrims    253 

cup  challenger  cling  with  bulldog  tenacity 
to  the  lee  of  our  boat,  but  I  wanted  to 
find  out  what  he  had  done  to  warrant 
the  Pilgrims  in  giving  him  a  dinner  at 
ten  per  plate. 

And  so  I  sent  my  secretary  down  to  the 
Astor  Library  and  she  came  back  loaded — 
with  information.  She  found  that  Lord 
Charles  was  a  sailor,  a  soldier,  a  diplomat,  a 
sailmaker,  a  boilermaker,  an  engineer,  a 
Member  of  Parliament,  and  other  things 
too  numerous  to  mention.  She  said  he  was 
born  in  1846 — which  is  a  libel — and  that 
he  bombarded  Alexandria.  She  didn't 
get  Alexandria's  last  name,  nor  did  she 
ascertain  what  Alexandria  had  done,  but  I 
am  sure  it  must  have  been  something  very 
unladylike  or  Sir  Charles  wouldn't  have 
bombarded  her. 

All  these  accomplishments  of  his  are 
praiseworthy,  but  it  is  as  a  sailor  that  I 


254  A  Few  Remarks 

venture  to  greet  him.  There  is  something 
about  "  a  wet  sheet  and  a  flowing  sail  and  a 
wind  that  follows  fast"  that  irresistibly 
appeals  to  me,  especially  when  I  am  on 
shore.  When  I  am  on  board  I  prefer  dry 
sheets,  as  I  have  a  little  tendency  to 
bronchitis;  and  I  prefer  the  flowing  bowl 
to  the  flowing  sail;  and  as  for  the  wind 
that  follows  fast,  I  like  best  a  wind  which 
follows  at  a  respectful  distance  and  with- 
out undue  haste. 

But  I  do  love  the  sea  and  those  who  go 
down  to  the  sea  in  ships,  and  I  love  the 
products  of  the  sea.  Look  at  salt  mackerel. 
We  have  all  seen  mornings  when,  lacking 
salt  mackerel,  we  would  have  starved  to 
death.  Salt  mackerel  sits  upon  a  stormy 
stomach  like  a  petrel  on  the  bosom  of  the 
foaming  wave. 

But  to  get  back  to  Lord  Charles !  I 
want  to  say  that  there  is  something  about 


Lord  Beresford  and  the  Pilgrims    255 

a  life  on  the  salt  and  antiseptic  sea  which 
sweetens  and  purifies  and  preserves  a  man 
so  that  even  a  subsequent  life  in  Parlia- 
ment cannot  spoil  him.  Of  all  the  naval 
officers  I  have  met,  I  have  yet  to  find  one 
who  was  not  gentle  and  kindly  and  lovable 
and  brave.  We  have  some  nice  men  in 
our  navy,  and  competent,  too. 

I  know  of  no  profession  which  requires 
greater  bravery  than  that  of  the  navy — 
unless  it  be  mine,  which  is  hotel-keeping. 
I  hope  Lord  Charles  will  forgive  me  for 
lugging  in  this  little  personal  advertise- 
ment, but  as  I  can't  eat  because  my  heart 
is  in  my  mouth,  and  I  can't  drink  for 
drink  steals  away  my  brains,  I  must  get 
square  with  the  game  somehow.  Of 
course,  the  hotel-keeper's  rewards  are 
greater.  He  doesn't  get  so  much  glory, 
but  glory  is  fleeting  and  you  can't  support 
a  family  on  it. 


256  A  Few  Remarks 

The  life  of  the  sailor  and  the  landlord 
have  some  features  in  common.  Both  trim 
their  sails  to  every  favoring  gale.  Both 
sail  as  close  to  the  wind  as  possible.  Both 
love  the  water,  but  love  it  best  "on  the 
side."  Both  are  happiest  when  half- 
seas  over  and  with  three  sheets  in  the 
wind.  But  while  the  sailor  puts  up  his 
nets  to  repel  boarders,  the  landlord 
spreads  his  nets  to  haul  them  in. 


IN  THE  SOUTH 


IN  THE  SOUTH 

A  FEW  weeks  ago,  at  Palm  Beach,  I 
was  walking  on  the  pier,  when 
a  man  dashed  up,  called  me  by  name,  and 
wrung  me  warmly  by  the  hand.  Now,  I 
have  lived  opposite  the  Grand  Central 
Depew  so  long  that  I  have  become  rather 
suspicious  of  these  hand-shakers,  and  I 
presume  my  greeting  was  somewhat  dis- 
tant and  haughty,  for  the  stranger  said: 
"I  see  you  don't  recognise  me."  I  gave 
him  the  old  gag  about  his  face  being 
familiar,  but  I  couldn't  place  him,  etc. 
"Why,"  said  he,  "you  delivered  a  mag- 
nificent oration  in  my  honour  at  the  Lotos 
Club  last  winter.     I  am  Elihu  Root." 

Well,  if  there  had  been  a    convenient 
knot-hole     around,     I'd     have     dropped 
through.     And  yet  how  can  I  be  expected 
259 


260  A  Few  Remarks 

to  remember  all  the  people  I  eulogise  in 
this  taffy-factory  and  soft-soap  dispensary  ? 
When  Chester  Lord  orders  me  to  come 
and  eulogise  a  man,  why,  I  come  and 
eulogise  him  without  regard  to  race,  colour, 
or  previous  condition  of  inebriety,  and 
when  I  have  gotten  through  with  my 
eulogy  I  just  go  on  about  my  business. 
I  don't  pay  any  particular  attention  to  the 
guest  of  honour,  or  try  to  impress  his 
likeness  upon  my  memory.  I  don't  have 
time.  As  I  explained  to  Mr.  Root:  I 
said,  "  You  men — cabinet  officers,  mayors, 
and  such — are  but  the  creatures  of  an  hour. 
You  are  hot  stuff  for  a  time,  and  you  have 
dinners  tendered  you,  and  bouquets  thrown 
at  you,  and  laurel  wreaths  placed  on  your 
brows,  but  it's  funny  what  a  difference 
just  a  few  hours  make!  The  next  thing 
we  know  you  are  out  of  a  job  and  back  at 
the  old  stand,  looking  for  law  business." 


In  the  South  261 

As  Bill  says: 

"For  men  may  come  and  men  may  go, 
But  me  and  Frank  Lawrence  and  Captain 
White  go  on  forever." 

And  then  these  guests  of  honour  look 
so  different  when  you  get  them  outside ! 
Take  them  away  from  the  centre'  of  the 
stage  and  the  glare  of  the  calcium,  and  that 
drawn  and  haggard  look  disappears  and 
they  appear  just  like  human  beings. 

Speaking  of  Palm  Beach.  This  was  my 
first  visit,  and,  in  my  opinion,  it  is  an 
earthly  paradise,  and  I  paid  my  board, 
too,  just  like  anybody  else.  When  I  left 
New  York  the  mercury  was  having  one  of 
those  sinking  spells  which  have  been  so 
prevalent  this  winter,  and  I  was  swathed 
in  furs  and  Jaegers  and  chilblains  and  my 
nose  was  working  overtime.  Forty  hours 
later,  my  dimpled  form  arrayed  in  a  cute 
little  bathing-suit,  I  was  disporting  my- 


262  A  Few  Remarks 

self  in  the  flashing  waters  of  the  Atlantic, 
surrounded  by  society  ladies,  ladies  who 
are  not  in  society,  ladies  who  are 
trying  to  butt  into  society,  million- 
aires, politicians,  John  Gates,  John  Jacob 
Astor,  and  other  tropical  amphibia.  As 
I  looked  about  me  and  recognised  the  mem- 
bers of  the  400  of  whom  I  have  so  often 
read  in  Town  Topics — people  whose  names 
are  household  words  in  each  other's  house- 
holds— I  felt  proud  to  think  I  lived  in  this 
free  land,  where  it  was  my  privilege  to 
bathe  in  the  same  swells  with  these  swells. 
I  was  afraid  to  venture  in  at  first  for  fear 
of  the  sharks  which  are  said  to  infest  these 
waters,  but  the  bathing-master  assured 
me  that  as  soon  as  the  Wall  Street  men 
came  down  the  local  talent  took  to  flight. 
Palm  Beach  is  well  named.  There  are 
palms  on  every  hand,  and  especially  on 
the  hands  of  the  coloured  employees,  and 


In  the  South    ■  263 

they  are  continually  waving,  thus  creating 
a  gentle  draught  on  the  pocketbook. 
Every  time  you  turn  around  you  are  held 
up  by  a  coloured  bandit  with  a  seductive 
smile  and  a  productive  whiskbroom,  and 
his  battle-cry  is  "No  quarter — nothing 
less  than  a  half  dollar." 

They  keep  the  pot  boiling  down  there, 
and  the  lid  is  off,  and  you  can  look  right  in. 
They  have  a  club  where  you  can  play 
games  of  chance.  They  are  not  really 
games  of  chance — they  are  sure  things. 
I  tried  it.  You  pick  a  number  and  put 
a  dollar  or  two  on  it,  and  if  the  marble 
rolls  right  you  get  thirty-five  for  one.  But 
I  proved  to  be  a  poor  picker.  Still,  you 
do  have  a  chance,  and  that  beats  Wall 
Street,  where  you  have  no  chance  at  al 
I  believe  if  Wall  Street  was  shut  up  and 
Canfield's  opened  we  could  all  have  more 
fun  with  our  money.     I've  tried  both  and 


264  A  Few  Remarks 

I  know  what  I'm  talking  about.     You  get 
broken  on  the  wheel  either  way. 

I  think  we've  got  a  great  little  mayor. 
I  like  his  looks.  He  looks  clean  cut,  well 
groomed,  and  trained  to  the  minute.  He 
comes  of  good  stock.  He  has  started  in 
right.  Some  of  us  who  didn't  vote  for 
him  had  an  idea  when  he  was  elected  that 
the  city  would  at  once  become  a  sort  of 
Sodom  and  Gomorrah.  Instead  of  that, 
the  minute  he  got  in  he  took  his  new  broom 
and  began  to  sweep,  and  apparently  his 
sainted  predecessor  had  left  quite  a  little 
dirt  around  in  the  corners.  And  then  he 
made  a  master-stroke.  He  advocated 
more  water  for  New  York.  Think  of  a 
Tammany  man  interesting  himself  in 
water !  And  now  they  talk  about  him  for 
President !  This  is  a  great  country.  One 
day  a  man  is  a  quiet  citizen  pursuing  the 
even  tenor  of  his  way,  and  the  next  day 


In  the  South  265 

he  wakes  up  and  finds  himself  a  Peerless 
Leader  with  a  capital  P.  I  hope  to  wake 
up  some  day  and  find  myself  a  peerless 
leader,  and  then  I  suppose  I'll  wake  up. 

They  say  our  little  mayor  is  likely 
Presidential  timber.  Well,  stranger  things 
have  happened!  But  if  the  two  great 
parties  don't  quit  scrapping  together, 
General  Miles  at  the  head  of  the  Prohibi- 
tion ticket  will  go  in  in  a  walk,  and  then 
with  our  new  salt-water  system  we  will 
have 

"Water,  water  everywhere, 
But  not  a  drop  to  drink." 


ON  CLOTHES  AND  CLOTHIERS 


ON  CLOTHES  AND  CLOTHIERS 

OF  course  I  know  something  about 
clothes.  I  have  always,  in  defer- 
ence to  the  tyranny  of  fashion  and  a  severe 
climate,  worn  clothes.  Not  always  such 
clothes  as  I  desired  to  wear,  but  still,  by 
courtesy,  clothes.  When  I  was  a  boy 
children  were  not  pampered  as  they  are 
now.  Liliputian  bazaars  were  infrequent. 
As  a  rule,  our  clothes  had  been  worn  pre- 
viously by  some  adult  relative  of  an 
entirely  different  style  of  architecture. 
Our  mothers  used  to  lay  us  on  the  floor, 
mark  around  us  with  a  piece  of  chalk,  and 
hew  out  alleged  garments  from  these  hand- 
me-downs.  The  results  were  serviceable 
rather  than  natty. 

269 


270  A  Few  Remarks 

I  recollect  appearing  at  school  one  day 
in  a  suit  carved  out  of  my  uncle's  army 
overcoat.  I  entered  with  some  misgivings. 
I  was  received  with  enthusiasm.  Remarks 
were  made  calculated  to  wound  my  feelings. 
In  order  to  provide  against  a  habit  I  had 
of  growing  rapidly,  tucks  had  been  made 
in  the  trousers,  intended  to  be  let  out  from 
time  to  time.  The  effect  was  more  strik- 
ing and  bizarre  than  fashionable.  It  was 
common  gossip  at  the  time  that  army 
clothes  were  made  of  shoddy — a  poor, 
flimsy  material.  The  gossip  was  un- 
founded. My  suit  wore  like  iron.  I  tried 
to  wear  it  out.  I  spent  hours  sliding  down 
cellar-doors  and  sitting  in  custard  and 
cranberry  pies,  and  spilling  food  on  myself, 
but  that  hateful  army  overcoat  was 
indestructible  and  imperishable.  Finally, 
in  despair,  I  set  to  work  and  outgrew  it, 
and   it   was   passed   along   to   a   younger 


On  Clothes  arid  Clothiers  271 

relative,  and  I  dare  say  some  unhappy- 
wretch  is  wearing  it  yet. 

Some  one  tells  me  that  the  manufacture 
of  clothing  is  New  York's  greatest  industry. 
Doesn't  it  seem  a  shame  that  the  Creator 
should  have  provided  every  other  living 
thing  free  of  charge  with  well-fitting  and 
self-renewing  clothing,  and  then  left  man, 
his  latest  and  noblest  work,  to  the  mercy 
of  you  fellows?  I  never  see  a  dog  or  cat 
without  a  feeling  of  envy.  Just  a  lick 
and  a  shake  and  a  scratch  and  the  toilet 
is  complete,  while  we  poor  mortals  wear 
out  our  lives  tying  and  untying,  and 
buttoning  and  unbuttoning. 

I  don't  suppose  you  will  agree  with  me, 
but  I  think  the  way  we  are  tyrannized 
and  bullied  by  the  makers  of  clothing  is 
outrageous.  We  can't  wear  what  we  con- 
sider comfortable  and  appropriate  and 
becoming,  but  we  must  wear  just  what  you 


272  A  Few  Remarks 

tell  us ;  and  no  sooner  do  we  lay  in  a  stock 
of  tight  trousers  and  get  broken  in  to  their 
use,  than  you  issue  an  edict  that  baggy 
ones  are  the  thing;  and  no  sooner  do  we 
buy  a  covert  coat  which  coyly  displays  the 
seat  of  the  trousers,  than  you  switch  us 
off  onto  Newmarkets  which  drag  on  the 
ground. 

And  then  men's  clothing  is  so  hideous ! 
Hamlet  says: 

"  'Tis  not  alone  my  inky  cloak,  good  mother, 
Nor  customary  suits  of  solemn  black." 

Ham  must  have  had  on  his  evening 
clothes  when  he  said  that!  "Customary 
suits  of  solemn  black"  just  describes  it. 
Isn't  it  queer,  then,  when  a  man  wants  to 
appear  gay  or  charming,  or  grace  a  festive 
occasion,  he  dons  one  of  these  spike-tailed, 
low-necked,  shad-bellied  atrocities,  which 
makes  him  look  like  a  cross  between  a 
hearse  and  a  morgue — a  suit  only  fit  to 


On  Clothes  and  Clothiers         273 

be  buried  in  and  not  really  appropriate 
for  that. 

Of  course  we  have  to  adapt  ourselves  to 
our  climatic  environments,  but  so  have 
the  women,  and  see  how  lovely  they  always 
look !  We  can't  wear  togas  because  we 
couldn't  pass  the  Flatiron  Building  on  a 
windy  day  without  making  talk,  and  we 
can't  wear  kilts  because  we  have  to  climb 
the  elevated  stairs,  but  it  seems  to  me  you 
might  liven  us  up  a  bit.  In  the  animal 
kingdom  the  male  is  always  better  appear- 
ing, but  the  plumage  of  man  is  far,  far 
from  gay. 

I  wish  you  would  think  this  over. 

You  all  seem  to  be  throwing  bouquets 
at  each  other  because  of  a  pernicious  habit 
you  have  of  opening  your  credit  books  for 
one  another's  inspection.  The  consequence 
is  that  an  ambitious  and  struggling  young 
merchant    cannot    buy    any    more    goods 


274  A  Few  Remarks 

than  he  can  pay  for.  This  is  what  I  call  a 
"combination  in  restraint  of  trade."  It 
may  be  all  right  for  you,  but  how  annoying 
to  the  man  of  small  capital,  large  family, 
and  a  previously  useful  gift  at  making  out 
attractive  statements.  I  shudder  to  think 
of  the  results  of  introducing  such  a  system 
into  the  retail  or  custom  trade.  Many 
of  our  best-dressed  young  men  would  have 
to  go  about  arrayed  in  barrels. 

But,  gentlemen,  you  are  doing  a  great 
work.  You  are  doing  what  every  trade 
must  do  sooner  or  later  or  go  broke.  You 
are  fixing  things  so  that  people  cannot 
do  business  entirely  on  wind.  Wind  and 
water  are  the  two  elements  which  are 
wrecking  so  many  of  our  business  enter- 
prises. Your  system  keeps  a  merchant 
where  he  belongs.  We  have  too  many 
folks  trying  to  run  a  hundred-horse-power 
engine     with     a    one -mule-power    boiler. 


On   Clothes   and   Clothiers  275 

If  it  wasn't  so  easy  to  get  credit  in  this 
country  we  couldn't  put  on  as  much  front, 
but  we  would  all  pay  one  hundred  cents 
on  the  dollar. 

Looking  over  the  membership  list  of  this 
association,  the  thought  strikes  me  that 
the  Jews  are  creeping  into  the  clothing 
business.  I  don't  see  a  Christian  (so-called) 
name.  I  am  afraid  this  is  another  case  of 
religious  intolerance.  If  this  thing  keeps 
on,  you'll  have  to  get  up  a  fund  and  send 
the  Christians  out  to  colonize  Palestine. 

I  notice,  however,  that  none  of  you  go 
into  the  hotel  business.  I  don't  blame 
you.  What,  with  the  price  of  coal  and 
meat  and  groceries,  it  has  become  a  mere 
philanthropic  pursuit,  and  a  hotel-keeper 
is  simply  a  fence  between  the  traveler  and 
the  tradesman. 


THE  RAINES  LAW 


THE  RAINES  LAW 

THE  Desert  of  Sahara  is  a  fashionable 
watering-place  compared  with  our 
city  on  Sunday.  The  historic  remark 
of  the  Governor  of  North  Carolina  to  the 
Governor  of  South  Carolina  regarding  the 
lapse  of  time  between  drinks  has  been 
frequently  reverted  to  of  late. 

The  Bible  tells  of  the  Children  of  Israel 
crossing  the  Red  Sea  dry  shod.  The 
Children  of  Israel  have  crossed  New  York 
City  a  good  many  times  lately  perfectly 
dry,  en  route  to  Brooklyn  or  Hoboken, 
and,  in  consequence,  have  formed  a  new 
political  party  called  the  "Garoos, " 
through  the  saving  grace  of  which  they 
hope  to  make  of  our  city  a  sort  of  new 
Garoosalum.     The    Bible    adds    that    the 

279 


A  Few  Remarks 

reformers  who  pursued  the  Children  of 
Israel  were  overwhelmed  by  the  sea, 
"chariot  and  horse,  and  there  remained 
not  so  much  as  one  of  them. "  I  think 
the  sea  which  is  likely  to  overwhelm  our 
Reformers  is  not  the  Red  Sea,  but  the 
Thomas    C.    (Piatt). 

Hotels  alone  are  permitted  to  sell 
liquor  on  Sunday,  and  then  only  with 
meals.  In  consequence,  every  gin-mill 
in  New  York  is  now  a  hotel.  It  is  easy 
to  create  a  hotel.  All  you  need  is  ten 
microscopic  bedrooms  and  a  cuisine  con- 
sisting of  a  half-dozen  indestructible 
celluloid  patent  fly-back  sandwiches, 
guaranteed  to  withstand  the  ravages  of 
time  and  not  to  soil,  crack,  split  or  mould. 

When  a  man  has  a  Sunday  thirst,  he 
hies  him  to  one  of  these  hotels,  and  is 
served  with  a  meal  consisting  of  one  of 
these   sandwiches,    with  boundless   liquor 


The  Raines  Law  281 

on  the  side.  Rumour  has  it  that  a  rash 
customer  once  essayed  to  eat  his  sandwich, 
but  was  prevented  by  the  indignant  pro- 
tests of  the  outraged  proprietor.  I  read 
in  the  Sun  of  a  brawl  in  a  so-called  hotel, 
where  a  man,  in  a  transport  of  rage, 
seized  a  petrified  Raines-law  sandwich 
and  brained  a  companion  therewith. 

This  law  was  made  in  the  interest  of 
temperance,  and,  like  most  of  the  moves 
along  that  line,  is  rapidly  tending  to 
make  inebriates  of  the  community  at 
large. 

I  do  not  object  to  the  selling  of  liquor 
by  saloons.  Their  patronage  and  ours 
do  not  conflict.  We  sell  liquor  on  Sunday 
because  the  law  holds  that  we  are  bound 
to  supply  our  guests  every  day  of  the  week 
with  what  they  require  in  the  way  of  food 
and  drink.  I  don't  know  of  a  hotel  in 
New  York  which  sells  enough  liquor  on 


2%2  A  Few  Remarks 

Sunday  to  pay  its  barkeepers.  But  I 
don't  like  the  law  which  permits  every 
saloon  to  convert  itself  into  a  hotel  by  the 
use  of  a  hammer,  nails,  a  few  planks  and 
an    indestructible    sandwich. 

Hotel-keeping  is  a  dignified  and  honour- 
able calling,  requiring  brains,  experience 
and  capital.  A  hotel  is  designated  as  a 
place  where  travelers  can  secure  lodging, 
food  and  drink.  Thanks  to  the  Raines 
law,  we  have  hundreds  of  places  in  New 
York,  masquerading  as  hotels,  where  no 
traveler  ever  sleeps  or  eats;  hotels  in 
name  only,  made  solely  for  the  purpose 
of  evading  the  law.  Some  decent;  some 
vile;  all  shams.  I  don't  object  to  them 
because  they  injure  our  business,  for  they 
don't;  but  I  object  to  our  calling  being 
brought  into  disrepute  by  their  existence. 
Why  call  them  hotels?  As  well  call 
Al.    Adams's    place    a    savings   bank,    or 


The  Raines  Law  283 

some  of   the  Tenderloin   resorts  a  young 
ladies'  seminary. 

I  admire  the  courage  of  Bishop  Potter 
and  Doctor  Rainsford  and  some  other 
bold  spirits  who  come  out  honestly  and 
say,  ' '  Let  the  saloons  stay  open  some 
hours  on  Sunday  with  the  sanction  of  the 
law,  instead  of  staying  open  all  hours  on 
Sunday,  as  now,  under  the  cloak  of 
hypocrisy,  pretending  to  be  what  they 
are  not — hotels.  "  And  yet,  the  men  who 
made  this  law,  made  it  knowing  it  was 
a  sham  and  a  fake  and  a  fraud,  are  now 
raising  their  eyes  to  Heaven  and  crying 
for  the  preservation  of  the  sanctity  of 
the  American  Sabbath.  Rot !  Why  call 
them  hotels?  Why  not  call  a  spade  a 
spade  ?  A  rose  by  any  other  name  would 
smell  as  sweet,  and  a  darned  sight  sweeter. 


THE  TROUBLES  OF  A  HOTEL  MAN 


THE  TROUBLES  OF  A  HOTEL  MAN 

THERE  is  no  class  of  men  in  the 
community  who  are  so  imposed 
upon  and  have  so  much  abuse  heaped 
upon  them,  and  get  so  fat  on  it,  as  the 
hotel  men.  The  law  looks  upon  the 
hotel  man  as  a  cross  between  a  licensed 
pirate  and  a  free  insurance  company. 
The  public  looks  upon  the  hotel  man  as 
one  whom  it  is  no  crime  to  rob,  no  dis- 
honour to  deceive,  and  a  crown  of  glory 
to  get  the  best  of  in  any  way  possible. 
We  supply  three-quarters  of  the  com- 
munity, free  of  charge,  with  soap,  towels, 
stationery,  toothpicks  and  intellect;  and 
yet  every  man  who  swells  our  coffers  by 
spending  ten  or  fifteen  cents  at  our  bar 
(and,     incidentally,     absorbs     thirty-five 

287 


288  A  Few  Remarks 

cents'  worth  of  free  lunch),  thinks  we 
are  grasping  monopolists,  and  devotes 
the  remainder  of  his  days  in  trying  to  get 
hunk  with  us.  We  are  supposed  to  be 
so  affluent  that  we  are  expected  to  head 
every  subscription  list,  to  contribute 
liberally  to  every  charity,  and  to  cash 
every  man's  check,  regardless  of  race, 
colour  or  previous  condition  of  servitude. 

Hotel  men  get  caught  on  bad  checks 
more  often  than  in  any  other  way.  It's 
the  worst  feature  of  the  business.  Men 
are  traveling  and  don't  want  to  carry 
large  sums  of  cash.  They  have  their 
funds  in  checks.  They  want  the  hotels 
to  be  their  bankers.  Of  course  we  like  to 
be  obliging,  but  it  is  hard  to  discriminate 
between  the  honest  and  the  dishonest, 
and  about  once  in  so  often  we  are  left 
with  a  worthless  check. 

And  speaking  of  checks,  last  summer,  in 


The  Troubles  of  a  Hotel  Man       289 

those  happy  days  before  the  Fair,  the 
Duke  of  Veragua  one  day  escaped  from 
the  Waldorf,  and,  being  in  our  neighbour- 
hood, he  found  himself  short  of  funds — a 
very  common  complaint  last  summer — 
a  sort  of  summer  complaint;  and  he  came 
into  our  hotel  and  asked  to  have  a  check 
cashed.  It  so  fell  out  that  the  clerk 
happened  to  have  one  of  those  lucid 
intervals,  which  clerks  do  occasionally 
have,  when  they  make  inquiries  before 
cashing  checks.  Usually  they  cash  the 
check  and  make  the  inquiries  afterward. 
So  he  said  to  the  Duke : 

"  I  haven't  the  honour  of  your  acquaint- 
ance, "  and  the  Duke  replied,  with  a  certain 
air  of  being  stuck  on  himself  which  seems 
to  be  characteristic  of  royalty: 

"I  am  the  sole  descendant  of  the 
immortal    Christopher    Columbus. " 

"Well,"   said  the  clerk,    "you  go  and 


290  A  Few  Remarks 

get  the  immortal  Chris,  to    indorse  your 
check,  and  we'll  cash  it  for  you." 

You've  probably  heard  about  the  con- 
tinual peculation  in  hotels.  No  one  real- 
izes the  extent  of  it  except  the  hotel 
men.  The  year's  loss  in  that  way  is 
simply  incredible.  Nobody  seems  to  have 
any  conscience  about  robbing  a  hotel. 
We  can't  keep  sugar-tongs  or  oyster-forks, 
or  after-dinner  coffee  spoons.  All  the 
silver  goes  fast.  Towels  vanish  like  magic. 
We  simply  can't  buy  towels  fast  enough 
to  keep  up  the  supply.  Traveling  men 
are  particularly  appreciative  towel  col- 
lectors. They  stock  up  here  in  New  York 
against  coming  towel  stringency  in  country 
towns.  Sometimes  I  think  the  women 
are  worse  at  that  than  the  men.  Yet  it 
was  a  man  that  played  the  limit  here; 
he  got  away  with  a  pair  of  blankets — cut 
holes  in  the   middle   of  them,    stuck  his 


The  Troubles  of  a  Hotel  Man       291 

head  through  the  holes,  put  on  his  long 
overcoat  and  buttoned  it  up,  and  started 
out  of  the  hotel.  The  corners  of  the 
blankets  hung  down  below  his  overcoat 
and  caught  the  clerk's  eye.  We  saved 
the  blankets. 

It  was  a  man,  too,  who  tried  to  steal 
our  marble  parlour  clock.  The  clock 
weighs  more  than  one  hundred  pounds. 
The  man  walked  right  into  the  parlour  and 
deliberately  took  this  superb  timepiece 
from  the  mantel.  There  were  guests  in 
the  room,  but  they  supposed  he  was  a 
clock-maker  on  business  bent.  He  lugged 
it  up  to  his  room.  A  chambermaid, 
opening  his  door  suddenly,  saw  him 
groveling  wildly  on  his  stomach  on  the 
floor  and  pushing  something  under  the 
bed,  but  she  didn't  think  anything  of  it. 
Hotel  people  aren't  easily  surprised.  After 
awhile    the     clock    was    missed   and   the 


292  A  Few  Remarks 

gossip  about  it  ran  through  the  hotel. 
The  chambermaid  remembered  the  human 
turtle.  She  trotted  up  to  his  room, 
dived  under  the  bed,  and  hauled  out  the 
clock. 

College  boys  have  a  taste  for  hotel 
souvenirs.  When  the  Yale-Princeton 
football  game  used  to  be  played  here,  the 
hotel  proprietors  had  to  hire  men  to  sit 
on  all  their  movable  property.  The  boys 
went  through  the  hotels  like  locusts 
through  a  farm.  We  didn't  even  have 
a  "This  way  to  the  elevator"  sign  left 
in  the  house  when  the  invading  horde 
swept  on. 

A  good  many  of  the  country  guests 
collect  hotel  souvenirs.  Uncle  Joshua 
comes  from  a  town,  where  he  can  live  on 
seventy-five  cents  a  week,  and  when  a 
hotel  man  asks  him  to  pay  $2.50  a  day  he 
thinks   he's   being   held   up   and   robbed. 


The  Troubles  of  a  Hotel  Man       293 

He  figures  that  everything  he  can  carry  off 
won't  begin  to  make  him  quits. 

But  the  country  guests  aren't  any 
lighter-fingered  than  the  city  guests.  The 
proprietor  of  one  of  our  finest  hotels  in 
New  York  told  me  of  a  lady  who  came  to 
visit  his  wife  at  their  country  home  last 
summer.  The  maid  went  up  to  unpack 
the  visitor's  trunks,  and  told  her  mistress 
that  the  trunks  were  full  of  towels  and 
silver  and  najjkins  and  pillow-shams  and 
all  that  sort  of  thing,  marked  with  the 
names  of  the  different  hotels  where  the 
visitor  had  been  staying.  The  joke  of  it 
was,  that  the  gems  of  the  collection  had 
been  gathered  from  the  hotel  of  the  man 
at  whose  house  the  woman  was  visiting. 
I've  an  idea,  founded  on  bitter  experience, 
that  thousands  of  happy  homes  in  this 
great  country  must  be  furnished  chiefly 
at  the  expense  of  New  York  hotel-keepers. 


294  A  Few  Remarks 

Every  hotel  has  its  crank  boarders. 
Sometimes  their  crankiness  takes  the 
form  of  what  is  politely  called  kleptomania. 
Everybody  in  the  hotel  knows  the  boarder 
lifts  things,  but  if  he  pays  his  bills  and  is 
unobjectionable  in  every  other  way  no 
scandal  is  stirred  up.  There  are  ways  of 
keeping  even  without  hard  feelings. 

At  one  of  the  good  old  New  York  hotels 
there's  an  old  lady  who,  for  thirty  years, 
has  stolen  a  plate  at  each  meal.  She 
picks  out  whatever  suits  her  fancy.  Every- 
body knows  she  does  it.  In  fact,  she 
doesn't  try  to  hide  the  little  propensity. 
She  has  her  hotel  room  full  of  the  plates, 
all  over  the  wall  and  the  shelves.  She's 
not  quite  right  in  her  mind,  but  she's 
unexceptional  in  regard  to  everything 
except  plates,  so  they  wink  at  that  little 
peculiarity.  The  proprietor  says  she  never 
tries  to  take  any  of  the  plates  out  of  the 


The  Troubles  of  a  Hotel  Man       295 

hotel,  and  that  she  will  never  go  away 
until  she  dies.  Then  he'll  get  his  property 
back.  Meanwhile,  she's  a  paying  patron, 
and  there's  no  use  hurting  her  feelings 
over  three  plates  a  day. 

I  don't  encourage  old  ladies  myself.  I 
like  them,  but  not  in  my  capacity  of  hotel 
proprietor.  When  they  come  to  stay,  I 
don't  try  hard  to  cater  to  them.  They 
go  away.  There's  one  hotel  in  town 
where  most  of  them  land.  They  don't 
admit  any  guests  at  that  hotel  unless 
they  have  gray  side  curls.  A  nice  old 
lady  is  nice,  but  the  average  old  lady  is  a 
troublesome  boarder,  and  we  have  enough 
troubles  without  courting  any. 

There  are  drawbacks  to  running  a 
hotel  next  door  to  a  railroad  station. 
Half  the  people  who  come  for  meals  are 
trying  to  catch  trains.  A  man  has  twelve 
minutes  to  spare,   and  he  comes  in  and 


29&  A  Few  Remarks 

orders  an  extra  thick  porterhouse.  In 
two  minutes  he  begins  to  squirm.  In 
three  minutes  he  calls  the  head  waiter 
and  says  he  ordered  a  steak  and  has  been 
waiting  three-quarters  of  an  hour.  In 
eight  minutes  he  goes  off  swearing  and 
blackguards  the  hotel  ever  after.  We've 
fixed  the  thing  now.  I  bought  a  time 
stamp.  The  clerk  stamps  each  order  with 
the  exact  time  it  is  given.  When  a  man 
at  the  end  of  three  minutes  swears  he's 
been  waiting  three-quarters  of  an  hour, 
we  take  the  stamped  check  to  him  and 
tell  him  he's  a  damned  liar.  Perhaps  we 
don't  do  exactly  that,  but  you  see  the 
idea.     This  hotel  business  is  very  trying. 


THE  HOTEL  GUEST 


THE  HOTEL  GUEST 

IT  is  said  that  the  word  "guest"  is 
derived  from  the  Saxon  gest,  or 
the  French  gist,  which  literally  means 
"a  stage  of  rest  in  a  journey."  Webster 
says  a  guest  is  '  'a  stranger  who  comes  from  a 
distance  and  takes  his  lodgings  at  a  place.  " 
I  meant  to  have  told  you  the  definition 
given  in  the  Century  Dictionary,  but  when 
I  came  to  look  for  the  volume  containing 
the  "G's"  in  our  hotel  library  I  discov- 
ered that  some  guest  of  a  literary  turn  of 
mind  had  carried  it  away  as  a  souvenir  of 
his  visit  to  the  metropolis. 

Mr.  Raines  thinks  a  guest  is  a  traveler 
who  comes  to  a  hotel  from  'way  back, 
accompanied  by  a  yearning  for  -reform, 
a  hair  trunk  with  his  initials  graven  thereon 

299 


3°°  A  Few  Remarks 

in  brass  nails,  and  a  rooted  aversion  to 
the  use  of  stimulants  on  the  Sabbath. 
Our  police  justices  hold  that  a  guest  is 
one  who,  on  week  days,  craves  a  meal  of 
several  courses,  but  who  on  Sunday  is 
content  to  dine  on  a  petrified  Raines  law 
sandwich  with  rum  on  the  side. 

But  whatever  the  definition  of  a  guest 
may  be,  we  all  know  that  of  late  years  he 
has  become  a  very  shy  bird,  easily  taking 
flight,  difficult  to  approach,  and  therefore 
hard  to  make  a  study  of.  I  came  near 
catching  one  this  summer,  but  he  eluded 
me  and  got  up  to  Fifty -ninth  Street  and 
Fifth  Avenue,  and,  although  I  saw  him 
first,  he  was  there  captured,  torn  into 
three  pieces  and  divided  around. 

You  must  forgive  me,  therefore,  if  my 
disquisition  upon  the  subject  assigned 
me  is  not  as  exhaustive  as  it  is  exhausting. 
I  am  happy  to  say,  however,  that  of  late 


The  Hotel  Guest  301 

there  are  symptoms  of  reviving  business; 
travelers  are  again  abroad,  the  hotel  clerk 
is  getting  haughty  once  more,  and  it  would 
seem  as  though  the  time  were  not  far 
distant  when  it  will  be  unnecessary  for 
the  hotel  man  to  retire  into  the  seclusion 
of  the  cellar  on  hearing  the  approaching 
footsteps  of  the  butcher. 

The  business  of  hotel-keeping  is  looked 
upon  as  very  fascinating  by  those  who  are 
not  engaged  in  it.  That  the  profits  are 
fabulous  every  one  knows  who  does  not 
have  to  pay  the  bills.  When  I  walk 
through  the  tessellated  corridors  of  my 
hotel,  I  can  see  the  guests  gazing  at  me 
with  awe,  and  can  hear  them  speaking 
with  bated  breath  of  the  vastness  of  my 
wealth.  This,  naturally,  makes  me  feel 
haughty,  and  after  such  an  experience 
it  is  grilling  to  have  to  go  and  plead  with 
my  horse-radish  man  to  extend  my  note. 


3°2  A  Few  Remarks 

I  suppose  this  popular  delusion  regard- 
ing the  profits  of  our  business  is  but 
natural.  A  man  of  small  means  comes 
to  the  city  from  his  native  town.  As  he 
timidly  approaches  the  counter,  a  gor- 
geously appareled  Ethiopian  dashes  up, 
wrenches  his  luggage  away  from  him,  and 
proceeds  to  remove  the  nap  from  his 
Sunday  suit  with  a  whisk-broom. 

Right  here  I  want  to  say  that,  in  my 
opinion,  the  whisk-broom,  in  the  hands  of 
the  stealthy,  insidious  African,  will  drive 
away  more  boarders  than  anything  yet 
devised.  I  never  permit  one  of  my 
employees  to  brandish  one  of  these  engines 
of  destruction.  I  would  sooner  have  a 
darkey  pull  a  razor  on  me  than  a  whisk- 
broom.  If  I  must  be  bled  to  death,  I 
want  to  have  it  over  quickly. 

But  to  revert  to  my  subject.  The 
timid  man  stands  in  front  of  the  clerk, 


The  Hotel  Guest  303 

and  the  clerk  affects  to  be  oblivious  of  his 
presence,  and  continues  to  relate  a  humor- 
ous anecdote  to  the  commercial  traveler. 
Finally  the  timid  man  plucks  up  courage 
to  ask  the  clerk  if  he  can  get  a  room.  The 
clerk,  with  a  look  of  disdain,  spins  the 
register  around,  projects  a  pen  at  the 
timid  man,  and  the  timid  man  feels  that 
the  really  proper  thing  for  him  to  do 
would  be  to  get  off  the  earth.  After  the 
registering  is  done,  the  clerk  selects  a  key 
at  random  and  hurls  it  at  the  timid  man, 
and  the  African  gentleman  drags  him 
away  and  slams  him  into  the  elevator. 
When  he  is  in  his  room,  the  coloured 
gentleman  brushes  away  the  last  remain- 
ing spark  of  vitality  which  yet  remains 
in  him  and  leaves  him  in  a  condition  of 
collapse. 

Now,   the  timid  man  is  naturally  im- 
pressed by  all  this,  and  he  jumps  to  the 


3  ©4  A  Few  Remarks 

conclusion  that  if  the  clerk  is  such  an 
autocrat,  the  proprietor  must  sit  on  a 
throne  with  a  diadem  on  his  brow. 

That  is  one  kind  of  a  guest — the  timid 
guest — but  there  are  a  good  many  who 
are  not  troubled  that  way.  Most  guests 
thoroughly  understand  the  art  of  getting 
all  there  is  to  get  out  of  the  hotel  man. 
On  the  whole,  I  think  the  guest  has  the 
big  end  of  it.  Pretty  much  everything 
is  done  in  our  modern  hotels  which  it  is 
possible  to  do  for  the  comfort  and  con- 
venience of  guests. 

Royalty  itself  is  not  better  housed  nor 
fed  nor  served  than  is  the  guest  in  the 
modern  hotel  of  to-day. 


AMENITIES  OF  STREET-CAR 
TRAVELING 


AMENITIES  OF  STREET-CAR 
TRAVELING 

AS  the  only  man  in  the  present 
assemblage  who  ever  rides  on 
street-cars,  or  at  any  rate  the  only  one 
who  ever  pays  fare  thereon,  I  alone  am 
competent  to  give  the  cold,  icy  facts 
relating  thereto.  When  a  man  has  to 
plunk  out  a  reluctant  nickel  every  time 
he  fails  to  elude  the  eye  of  the  conductor 
he  is  apt  to  become  captious  and  cynical, 
and  to  notice  certain  failings  which  short- 
sighted deadheads  would  never  observe. 

When  I  learned  that  St.  Clair  McKelway, 
of  Brooklyn,  was  to  be  one  of  the  speakers 
this  evening,  I  was  glad,  because  I  consider 
h'm  one  of  the  slickest  of  us  orators. 

Brooklyn,  as  you  know,  is  situated 
between  the  Borough  of  Manhattan  and 
3o7 


3°8  .4  Few  Remarks 

Greenwood  cemetery — midway  between 
pleasure  and  the  grave — and  has  produced 
some  great  men  besides  Mr.  McKelway. 
Seth  Low  and  Tim  Woodruff  and  Mr. 
Shepard  all  emanate  from  Brooklyn.  I 
sprang  from  Brooklyn  myself.  I  sprang 
from  Brooklyn  the  minute  I  had  money 
enough  to  pay  board  in  New  York,  and 
I  am  proud  of  it.  Brooklyn  has  a  wonder- 
ful street-car  system.  You  can  ride  more 
miles  there  for  five  cents,  and  have  less 
company  while  doing  so,  than  in  any  other 
city  in  the  world.  I  am  the  proud  pos- 
sessor of  one  hundred  shares  of  Brooklyn 
Rapid  Transit  stock.  I  hold  onto  it  for 
the  same  reason  that  a  man  holds  on  to  a 
live  wire.  I  can't  let  go.  I  hold  it  as  a 
heritage  for  my  grandchildren.  I  expect 
they  will  live  to  see  a  dividend  declared 
on  it.  We  are  a  long-lived  race.  The 
certificate  is  a  beautiful  work  of  art.     I 


Amenities  of  Strett-car  Traveling  3°9 

go  down  to  my  broker's  office  sometimes 
and  he  lets  me  look  at  it.  In  one  corner 
there  is  a  lovely  portrait  of  Lydia  Pinkham 
just  after  taking  a  dose  of  her  own  medi- 
cine, and  in  the  other  a  group  representing 
Faith,  Hope  and  Charity  trying  to  get  the 
strangle-hold  on  each  other.  Some  day, 
when  I  have  saved  up  money  by  using 
the  annual  which  I  have  been  expecting 
from  the  Metropolitan,  I  am  going  to  have 
this  certificate  framed,  with  a  wide  margin 
— you  need  a  wide  margin  on  Brooklyn 
Rapid  Transit — and  hang  it  up  in  my 
bathroom,  where  I  can  look  at  it  Saturday 
nights  except  in  extremely  cold  weather. 

I  have  observed  with  much  solicitation 
the  career  of  Mr.  Vreeland.  The  papers 
say  he  is  a  self-made  man,  and  he  looks 
as  if  he  rather  overdid  the  job.  He  began 
at  the  bottom  of  the  ladder,  parted  from 
the  top  rung  long  ago,  and  is  still  climbing. 


3*°  A  Few  Remarks 

His  ambition  is  boundless,  and  he  may 
yet  live  to  have  a  cigar  named  after  him. 
Every  Christmas  morning  he  wakes  up 
and  finds  $50,000  in  his  socks — twenty- 
five  in  each  sock.  Vreeland  always  lands 
with  both  feet.  This  is  just  a  little 
tribute  of  affection  from  his  directors. 
When  they  give  him  anything,  they  sock 
it  to  him.  I  hope  it  doesn't  come  out  of 
the  stockholders.  I  am  a  stockholder  in 
that  road,  too.     Oh,  I'm  an  easy  mark  ! 

The  real  story  of  Mr.  Vreeland' s  rise  is 
this:  He  was  steward  down  in  the 
Madison  Avenue  car-stables  and  one  of 
his  duties  was  to  water  the  horses.  Even 
the  horses  had  to  take  water  when  Vree- 
land came  around.  They  nourished  their 
horses  on  water  and  straw,  and  in  hot 
weather  they  allowed  them  the  privilege 
of  drinking  the  water  through  the  straw. 
Well.    W.    C.    Whitney   happened   to   see 


Amenities  of  Street-car  Traveling  311 

him  engaged  in  the  prosecution  of  his 
duties,  and  he  said  to  himself,  "Any  man 
who  is  as  skilful  as  that  at  watering  stock 
ought  to  be  at  the  head  of  the  Metropolitan 
Traction  Company."  So  they  put  him 
in  charge  of  the  Bureau  of  Printing  and 
Engraving,  at  a  salary  of  $1,000,000  a 
year,  and  he's  a  bargain  at  that,  for  he 
can  rush  out  fresh  editions  of  stock  and 
bonds  quicker  than  a  yellow  journal  can 
print  extras. 

But  Vreeland  has  instituted  quite  a 
lot  of  reforms  in  our  street-car  system. 
It  was  he  who  conceived  the  idea  of 
making  the  seats  of  the  open  cars  just  too 
wide  for  four  people  and  just  too  narrow 
for  five.  The  consequence  is  that  no 
sooner  do  four  people  get  comfortably 
seated  than  a  fifth  appears,  usually  a  large, 
sprightly  lady,  quite  broad  across  the 
narrows,    who,    with    an    air    of    careless 


312  A  pew  Remarks 

abandon,  flings  herself  bodily  into  the 
breach.  This  is  a  good  thing,  because  it 
brings  people  into  closer  touch  with  each 
other — so  close,  indeed,  that  one  often 
gets  touched  for  a  watch  or  pocketbook. 

In  another  of  his  lucid  intervals  he 
got  up  the  scheme  of  heating  cars  by 
placing  at  intervals  under  the  seats 
electric  broilers,  thus  applying  the  heat 
direct  where  it  will  do  the  most  good. 
Consequently,  when  a  man  gets  home  at 
night  he  has  chilblains  on  his  feet  and 
blisters  elsewhere.  On  warm,  humid, 
winter  days,  the  conductors  hermetically 
seal  up  the  cars  so  that  no  air  can  enter, 
and  then  turn  these  electric  broilers  on  at 
a  pressure  of  eight  thousand  amperes. 
On  cold  days  the  heat  is  turned  off  and 
all  the  ventilators  are  opened  wide.  This 
has  a  tendency  to  make  our  race  hardy, 
since  only  the  strong  survive. 


Amenities  of  Street-car  Traveling  313 

And  now  he  is  giving  his  attention  to 
the  invention  of  some  scheme  by  which 
ladies  will  be  prevented  from  leaping  off 
cars  backward  while  they  are  running  at 
full  speed.  This  habit,  so  popular  with 
the  fair  sex,  coupled  with  their  practice 
of  invariably  standing  on  the  lower 
corner  and  waving  their  parasols  at 
approaching  cars,  has  put  many  a  con- 
ductor into  such  nervous  prostration  that 
he  even  goes  so  far  as  to  forget  to  ring  up 
an  occasional  fare. 

However,  I  am  glad  the  women  have 
taken  up  the  transportation  problem. 
They  are  going  to  compel  the  traction 
companies  to  provide  each  female  woman 
with  a  seat,  hot  and  cold  water,  and 
electric  curling-irons.  It  makes  a  man's 
blood  boil  to  think  that  his  wife,  after  a 
hard  day's  shopping,  is  compelled  to  ride 
home  in  a  car  seated  in  some  other  fellow's 


314  A  Few  Remarks 

lap,  or  that  she  should  be  jostled  by  rude 
working-men,  who  have  the  nerve  to  ride 
home  from  work  when  such  excellent 
walking  facilities  are  provided.  Some- 
times I  have  thought  it  would  be  as  well 
for  the  non-working  women  to  get  home 
before  the  rush  hours,  but  I  have  never 
dared  to  suggest  it  in  the  bosom  of  my 
family. 


I  I  I   I 

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